THEllDOW'sTkUST 



TlBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

Shelf. 

I'XITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



" This is my comfort in my affliction; for Thy Word 
hath quickened me." — Psalm cxix. 50. 



Widows Trust. 

BY 

MRS. MARTHA TYLER GALE. 

"Let thy widows trust in me." — Jeremiah xlix. n. 

"And when the Lord saw her, He had compassion on her, and 
He said, Weep not."— St. Luke vii. 13. 



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<£* (( A 

' NEW YORK:" 
ROBERT CARTER AND BROTHERS, 

530 Broadway. 
1879. 



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By Robert Carter & Brothers. 
1878. 



Cambridge : 
Press of John Wilson dr» Son. 



CONTENTS. 



De Profundis 



PAGE 

9 



II. 
Naomi : The Homeless Widow 39 



Ruth : The Widow turning to God in 
Affliction 57 



IV. 

The Widow of Sarepta 



83 



v. 
The Widow in Debt 105 



Anna: The Aged Widow, waiting for 
Redemption 127 



CONTENTS. 



VII. 

PAGE 

The Widow again bereaved 145 

VIII. 

The Oppressed Widow 163 

IX. 

The Charitable Widow 191 

X. 
Ministering Widows 213 

XI. 

Widows Indeed 235 



T 



THE WIDOWED HEART. 

[S thine a widowed heart? 
Each tie asunder torn ; 
Does one sad wish alone remain, 
Swiftly to travel till thou gain 
The parted spirit's bourne ? 
Would'st thou fain sleep 
Where death doth keep 
That slumbering form beloved, in delved cham- 
ber deep ? 

Poor, bleeding, widowed heart ! 

Man's words less heal than probe ; 
Not in man's pity canst thou find 
Balm for thy wound or power to bind ; 
Still must it bleed and throb ! 
Friends pitying mourn, 
Then sadly turn 
To hide their fruitless tears, and looks that o'er 
thee yearn, 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



Alas ! poor widowed heart, 

What sorrows press on thee ! 
Each object that now meets thine eye, 
Each hour that wearily goes by, 
Remembrances will be 
Of joys all fled, 
And smiles that shed 
Bliss o'er that rifled heart, where all but grief 
seems dead. 

Poor, desolated heart ! 

If yet some joy remain, 

If in thy lonely path so drear 

One lingering, uncrushed flower appear, 

To bid thee smile again, 

Who now partakes 

The smile it wakes, 

Or, culling it for thee, of tenfold value makes ? 

Alas ! poor widowed heart ! , 
No signs thy grief express, 
No human eye beholds thy tears ; 
No ear thy sob of anguish hears ; 
In utter loneliness ! 
Calm, nay serene, 
Midst anguish keen, — 
Thy deep, deep hidden wound by God alone is 
seen. 



THE WIDOWED HEART 



Alas ! poor widowed heart ! 

The charms of infant glee, 
Thy little ones' unconscious smiles, 
Their prattled words and artless wiles 
Wake only grief in thee. 
The eye they blessed, 
The lip they pressed, 
On them no longer beams, nor smiles, nor is 
caressed. 

Alas ! poor widowed heart ! 

What now will be thy stay ? 
The staff so fondly leant upon, 
Thy guide, thy counsellor is gone, 
For ever torn away ! 
Each link unbound 
Which clasped thee round, 
No second self for thee, left all alone, is found. 

For thee, poor widowed heart, 

In vain sweet spring returns ; 
The charm of vernal songs and flowers, 
The joys reviving Nature showers 
Touch not the heart that mourns ; 
Or touch it so, 
As wakes fresh woe 
For one all darkly laid, this blooming earth below. 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST 



Yet still, poor widowed heart, 

Though desolate and sad, 
The thought, thy mourned one ne'er can know 
Thine own unutterable woe, 
Almost might make thee glad ! 
The Blest deplore 
Earth's griefs no more ; 
And though thy joys are fled, thy loved one's tears 
are o'er. 

Poor, broken, widowed heart, 
To God disclose thy pain ! 
Earth yields no cure ; but Heaven has given 
A balm for hearts bereft and riven, 
A balm ne'er tried in vain ! 
That volume bright, 
Where beams of light 
Illume the Eternal worlds, reveal it to thy sight." 

Charlotte Elliott. 



DE PROFUNDI S. 



" Out of the depths have I cried unto Thee, O Lord ! " 
Psalm cxxx. r. 

" All Thy waves and Thy billows are gone over me. 

" Yet the Lord will command His loving-kindness in the 
daytime, and in the night His song shall be with me, and 
my prayer unto the God of my life." — Psalm xlii. 7, 8. 

" I know, O Lord, that Thy judgments are right, and 
that Thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me." — Psalm cxix. 
75- 

" The Lord is my portion, saith my soul ; therefore will 
I hope in Him. 

" For the Lord will not cast off for ever : 

" But though He cause grief, yet will He have compas- 
sion according to the multitude of His mercies." — Lam- 
entations iii. 24, 31, 32. 



^ 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



THE face which, duly as the sun, 
Rose up for me with life begun, 
To mark all bright hours of the day 
With hourly love, is dimmed away, — • 
And yet my days go on, go on. 



The tongue which, like a stream, could run 
Smooth music from the roughest stone, 
And every morning with "Good day" 
Make each day good, is hushed away, — 
And yet my days go on, go on. 



The heart which, like a staff, was one 
For mine to lean and rest upon, 
The strongest on the longest day 
With steadfast love, is caught away, — 
And yet my days go on, go on. 



I2 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

IV. 
And cold before my summer's done, 
And deaf in Nature's general tune, 
And fallen too low for special fear, 
And here, with hope no longer here, 
While the tears drop, my days go on. 

V. 
The past rolls forward on the sun 
And makes all night, O dreams begun 
Not to be ended ! Ended bliss, 
And life that will not end in this ! 
My days go on, my days go on. 

VI. 

Breath freezes on my lips to moan ; 
As one alone, once not alone, 
I sit and knock at Nature's door, 
Heart bare, heart hungry, very poor, 
Whose desolated days go on." 

Mrs. Browning. 




I. 



IKTARA} I wish there were no such word 
as Widow in the language. I have 
been widowed for years ; but the very name 
strikes the same dread over me as at first. I 
am still ; for I know my sorrow comes from 
God ; and though He slay me, yet will I trust 
in Him. I smother all my sobs and try to 
smile cheerfully on the happy ones, who have 
no conception of our sorrow ; but with you, 
who know the grief of a desolate heart, I 
may speak without reserve. Only the heart 
that was pierced on Calvary knows the depth 
of our sorrow. As I said, the very name still 
cuts me like a knife. 

Eirene? I wonder you regard the name 
in that way. God uses it so tenderly, and so 

1 Ruth i. 20. 2 St. John xiv. 27. 



I4 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

frequently in His Word, speaking of widows, 
as well as the fatherless, as His peculiar 
care ; protecting them by so many commands, 
comforting them by so many promises, and 
denouncing judgment upon those who wrong 
and oppress them. He has given a sort of 
sacredness to the name, calling Himself es- 
pecially the widow's God, and the Father of 
the fatherless, and saying : " Let your widows 
trust in me." He really appears to take them 
into the tenderest relations to Himself. He 
says : " Thou shalt not remember the reproach 
of thy widowhood any more, for thy Maker 
is thy husband." 

Mara. It is because He knows, as no 
other can, the heart of the widow, and under- 
stands that none need comfort so sadly. He 
singles us out, because we represent the most 
utter desolation and loneliness the heart can 
suffer. God's pity and care are measured, 
you know, by the measure of our grief. 

Eirene. Is not the knowledge of this pity 
and care a comfort ? 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



15 



Mara. Yes, surely, it is a comfort ; but 
it is not a cure. 

Eirene. You do not let the balm sink 
down into the wound, or it would heal your 
broken heart : its virtue is omnipotent. 

Mara. I apply it constantly, or I should 
despair ; but the wound is so deep and sore ! 
God intended it should be a rooted sorrow. 

Eirene. Yes. He intended we should 
cherish a subdued, chastened spirit, but not 
continue to indulge such grief as you express. 

Mara. I struggle against it, but do not 
yet overcome. When I think I am growing 
stronger, the sorrow rolls over me like a great 
wave, and overwhelms me, as some new re- 
minder of my loss occurs, or some sense of 
need returns. At such times, I wake from 
troubled sleep, with a numb sense of pain, 
wondering at first why my heart is so sore. 
Often I am roused at the hour of thickest dark- 
ness, with a new shock of grief, as if some one 
had suddenly shouted in my ear: " Your son 
is drowned ! Your husband has been killed." 



l6 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

Eirene. There were circumstances of pecu- 
liar aggravation in your case, and it is long 
before the shattered nerves recover from such 
a shock. It is your positive duty to divert 
your mind. Do you find no relief in travel ? 

Mara. Journeying with him was once a 
pleasure. Now it seems like aimless wander- 
ing. But I have travelled. We went abroad 
for a year, after breaking up. I think it 
helped me over the shock of leaving the old 
home. But have you any idea how many 
mourners seek relief in foreign travel ? We 
met such numbers of American tourists in 
deep mourning. It seemed a sad procession 
of lonely women : childless mothers ; daugh- 
ters who had worn themselves out nursing 
aged parents ; and widows, most desolate of 
all. One's sympathies were constantly drawn 
upon, and one sad confidence prepared the 
way for another. Then one is constantly 
reminded of the kind care, the considerate 
thoughtfulness, that once blessed us, the wis- 
dom in which we trusted, the strength upon 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



*7 



which we used to lean, the love which never 
failed us. And when the time comes for 
returning — I used to think the best part 
of a journey was the coming home : now I 
have no home to return to ! 

Eirene. You, of all others, should not say- 
that. Think how many poor widows are left 
utterly without a home. You have so many 
good homes ! 

Mara. Yes ; but I know the sorrow of the 
homeless. Many homes are not a home, — 
not the one home with him who would have 
made a home for me in the midst of a Sahara 
desert or by the frozen Pole. I go from one 
place to another restlessly : I know not which 
is the most like home. I cannot settle down 
calm and restful in any of them. Even the 
dear old place would have been a constant 
reminder of his absence. 

"Can I call that home where I anchor yet, 
Though my good man has sailed ? 
Can I call that home where my nest was set, 
Now all its hope hath failed ! " 



18 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

Eirene. Do you remember the new Beati- 
tude some one has suggested, — "Blessed are 
the homesick, for they shall reach home at 
last " ? We have lost our earthly habitation : 
let us look forward to the place which Christ 
has prepared for us in His Father's house. 
And we shall find our dear ones waiting for 
us in that heavenly home. You know Bishop 
Keble's verses : — 

" 'Tis sweet, as year by year we lose 
Friends out of sight, in faith to muse 
How grows in Paradise our store." 

Then you have other mercies to be grateful 
for. Your children are a blessing to you. 
Some widows are troubled with unruly and 
disobedient children, who have lost too early 
the restraining influence of a father. Others 
are left in poverty, and perhaps obliged to ex- 
change ease and luxury for hard labor. You 
have a comfortable support, and no reason to 
fear for the future. 

Mara. I am grateful ;' but widowhood is a 
grief which riches cannot alleviate, although 



DE PROFIJNDIS. 



poverty may aggravate it. And yet I do not 
know but I have thought it may be a blessing 
sometimes not to have leisure to grieve. One 
trial may take off the mind from another. 

Eirejie. I suppose to each one of us our 
own grief seems the heaviest. " The heart 
knoweth its own bitterness." It seems al- 
most a sacrilege to use the words, but the 
widowed heart often adopts them : " Is there 
any sorrow like unto my sorrow ? " 
♦ Mara. Then the perplexities and cares of 
property are so trying. My husband saved 
me from all care. I am so helpless and 
troublesome. I feel mortified at my ignorance 
of business matters. 

Eirene. Do you think the perplexities of 
poverty would be less trying, — the necessity 
of finding some way of earning a support, 
perhaps the uncertainty of needful food and 
raiment ? Many poor widows suffer these 
perplexities ; but all may find a refuge in the 
promises of the widow's God. The Lord is 
our Shepherd, we shall not want. You leaned 



20 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



upon an arm of flesh, and it failed you : now 
" the Eternal God is thy refuge, and under- 
neath are the everlasting arms." Is not 
this better ? Let us not be tear-blinded to 
our remaining mercies. What a comfort your 
children have been to you ! How their char- 
acters have developed and strengthened under 
this trial ! They have grown self-reliant and 
manly ; and how tender and considerate for 
your comfort ! We have lost some friendships 
that we rested in : tried by the touchstone 
of sorrow, they have proved unworthy ; but 
others have been raised up, to comfort and 
sustain us. " A friend loveth at all times, and 
a brother is born for adversity." If they can- 
not stand this test, let them go : they are not 
worth regretting. Then how can we be suffi- 
ciently thankful for the love that was ours so 
long, — that so many years of our lives were 
blessed by husbands worthy to be mourned f 
Think of the dreary lives on which love never 
shone ; of hearts forsaken and deceived by 
its false image ; of the poor souls to whom 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



widowhood is a release from bondage, whose 
weeds are but a mockery ! Would you ex- 
change your grief for theirs? Ah, no! I 
hear you say : — 

" I hold it true, whate'er befall ; 
I feel it when I sorrow most : 
'Tis better to have loved and lost 
Than never to have loved at all." 

And the love is not lost. We must never for- 
get that. It waits for us behind the vail. 

Mara. That brings me to another of our 
troubles, — perhaps I should call it a tempta- 
tion. Have you not felt this intense longing 
for death, this utter weariness of life, — 

" Here, with love no longer here," — 

And longed — 

" Only to lift the turf unmown 
From off the earth where it has grown, 
Some cubic space, and say, Behold, 
Creep in, poor heart, beneath that fold, 
Forgetting how the days go on " ? 

Eirene. It is a temptation as old as human 
nature. Job struggled with it : " Wherefore 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



is light given unto him that is in misery, and 
life unto the bitter in soul ; which long for death, 
but it cometh not ; . . . which rejoice exceed- 
ingly, and are glad, when they can find the 
grave ? " " My soul chooseth . . death rather 
than my life. I loathe it ; I would not live 
alway. O that Thou wouldest hide me in the 
grave ! " But his faith triumphed : " Though 
He slay me, yet will I trust in Him." " All 
the days of my appointed time will I wait, till 
my change come. Thou shalt call, and I will 
answer thee : Thou wilt have a desire to the 
work of Thine hands." God give us grace 
to live. 

Mara. Life is so hard ! Death would be 
so easy ! 

Eirene. Try to think of it as something 
you can do for Christ. Pascal says, " We 
bear with life for the sake of Him who 
suffered both life and death for us." He was 
"a man of sorrows, and acquainted with 
grief." Is there a drop of bitterness in life's 
cup which He did not taste ? 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



23 



" Who mourns 
Or rules with Him, while days go on ? 

"Take from my head the thorn- wreath brown ! 
No mortal grief deserves that crown." 

Mara. Did He suffer as we do, from the 
sickening dread of coming grief ? Those who 
have never lost friends think it impossible their 
loved ones should die ; but, the circle once 
broken, they hold their remaining treasures 
with fear and trembling, dreading lest they 
also be taken. In my crushed, helpless state, 
I am constantly fearing some new blow. 

Eirene. Have you forgotten Gethsemane, 
and the cry, "If it be possible, let this cup 
pass from me " ? Submission means acceptance 
of future grief, as well as past and present. 

Mara. But how can we be willing before- 
hand ? 

Eirene. Christ was. " If this cup may not 
pass away from me except I drink it, Thy will 
be done." You remember the passage in He- 
brews : " Who in the days of his flesh, when he 



24 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



had offered up supplications with strong crying 
and tears unto Him that was able to save him 
from death, and was heard in that he feared." 
Whatever it was, this mysterious cup, the 
strength desired was given. "We have not 
an High Priest which cannot be touched with 
the feeling of our infirmities," and we have 
His promise : " My grace is sufficient for thee, 
for my strength is made perfect in weakness." 
Let us trust in Him, and hush forebodings. 
What have we to do with a future we may 
not live to see? All that God requires of us 
is to live patiently, bravely, earnestly, to-day. 
And He promises the strength to do it. " As 
thy day, so shall thy strength be." But Christ 
bids us " take no thought for the morrow." 
" Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." 
" Him trust with all sad memories and dim 
fears." 

Mara. It is my desire and effort to do so. 
Though I have made such complaints, you 
must not infer that I do not resign myself 
entirely to the will of God, nor that I doubt 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



25 



His love for me. I know " whom the Lord 
loveth He chasteneth." 

I have myself given medicine to a darling 
child, weak and sick unto death, when it re- 
quired such an effort for him to raise his head, 
or even open his lips to receive the nauseating 
draught, that it seemed cruel to rouse him 
from partial rest, and urge it upon him. It 
cut me to the heart to do it. Thus I regard 
God as my tender father, standing over his 
frail, sinful child, presenting this cup, and 
saying : I know your weakness and deathly 
faintness, I know how the thought of its 
lasting bitterness makes you shudder, and how 
you dread the sickness it causes ; but I judge 
it best for you, I wish you to take it. So I 
submit ; I acquiesce completely ; I hold my 
breath, and brace myself, as did my dutiful 
child, to drink it without one murmur. I have 
no distrust of God's goodness, His wisdom, 
or His love for me, even me. 

Eireiie. If you are thus submissive, you 
will surely find relief. 



26 THE WIDOWS TRUST. 

" Who in God his hopes hath placed 
Shall not life in pain outwaste." 

God only chastens while we need the pain. 

Mara. Do not say that all this is necessary 
for me ! I do not seem to myself worth such 
an outlay of pain and discipline. Cannot our 
sufferings, in some mysterious way, benefit 
others, — as St. Paul speaks of "filling up 
that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ, 
for His body's sake, which is the church"? 
And you know the passage in the 1st Epistle 
of St. Peter : " Beloved, think it not strange 
concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, 
as though some strange thing happened unto 
you : but rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers 
of Christ's sufferings ; that, when His glory 
shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with 
exceeding joy." 

It has seemed to me at times, that, weak as 
I am, I could even rejoice in affliction, if I 
could hope that, through it, some good might 
be accomplished for others. Do you remem- 
ber that poem of Adelaide Procter's, — " Light 
and Shade " ? 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



27 



* Then I would have thee strive to see 
That good and evil come to thee 
As one of a great family. 

The cry wrung from thy spirit's pain 
May echo on some far-off plain, 
And guide a wanderer home again. 

Toil, yet rejoice ; because no less 
The failure that makes thy distress 
May teach another full success. 

It may be that, in some great need, 
Thy poor life's fragments are decreed 
To help build up a lofty deed. 

It may be that, when all is light, 
Deep set within that deep delight 
Will be to know why all was right. 

To hear life's perfect music rise, 
And, while it floods the happy skies, 
Thy feeble voice to recognize. 

Then strive more gladly to fulfil- 
Thy little part. This darkness still 
Is light to every loving will. 

And trust, as if already plain, 
How just thy share of loss and pain 
Is for another's fuller gain." 



2 8 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

Eirene. I am glad you stop there, without 
quoting the verses which always seemed to 
me to imply a Romish superstition: — 

" Then thou mayest take thy loneliest fears, 
The bitterest drops of all thy tears, 
The dreariest hours of all thy years, 

And, through thy anguish then outspread, 
May ask that God's great love would shed 
Blessings on some beloved head." 

There is a great deal of vicarious suffering in 
the world. I do not know how much good it 
does, but it is inevitable. No one can do 
wrong, and suffer the consequences alone. 
The innocent suffer with the guilty, and for 
the guilty. How many wakeful nights and 
hours of agonizing prayer are suffered by 
mothers for their sons, sisters for their brothers, 
wives for their husbands ! Such suffering 
may have no efficacy as merit, to take the place 
of punishment due toothers, or to bring down 
blessings upon undeserving heads ; but, if it 
makes us more importunate in prayer, more 
conscious of our utter dependence upon God, 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



2 9 



stronger in faith, more cheerful in hope, and 
develops in us that love which beareth, be- 
lieveth, hopeth, endureth all things, and never 
failetk, God may work through us, as instru- 
ments, the answer to our prayers. Or even 
if we pass away, and seem to see no answer, 
God zv ill not forget. " The seed of the right- 
eous shall be blessed." " He that goeth forth 
and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall 
doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing 
his sheaves with him." Probably Saint Paul 
referred chiefly to his spiritual anxieties 
and trials, as when he mentioned " that 
which cometh on me daily, the care of all the 
churches," as the culmination of his "weariness 
and painf ulness ; " and also his " great heaviness 
and continual sorrow of heart," when he could 
almost wish himself accursed from Christ for 
his brethren, his kinsmen according to the 
flesh ; and when he says, " My little children, 
of whom I travail in birth again, until Christ 
be formed in you." 

The partakers of Christ's sufferings mourn 



30 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



with a divine compassion over the sins and 
punishments of men, as when Nehemiah and 
Daniel, like Christ, wept over the sad fate of 
Jerusalem. If we thus know "the fellowship 
of His sufferings, we shall also share His joy. " 
"These things have I spoken unto you, that 
my joy might remain in you, and that your 
joy might be full. This is my commandment, 
That ye love one another, as I have loved you. 
Greater love hath no man than this, that a 
man lay down his life for his friends." l 

Such suffering for others is truly the bearing 
of another's burdens, by which we fulfil the 
law of Christ. But even the personal griefs 
of the believer draw him closer to Jesus, and 
bring him into deeper sympathy with His re- 
deeming work. 

Prayer avails most that is offered under 
pressure of some great burden, and we gen- 
erally do most good after enduring keen 
sorrow of our own. A successful laborer 
remarked, " I have always had some great 

1 St. John xv. II, 12, 13. 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



31 



trial, as a preparation for accomplishing much 
good." 

Every. experience of sorrow and pain should 
enlarge our sympathy and fit us for greater 
usefulness. You remember how Mrs. Stowe 
speaks of sorrow as " the great birth agony of 
immortal powers ;• a searcher and revealer of 
hearts. Sorrow reveals forces in ourselves we 
never dreamed of. Who values the natures 
that cannot suffer ? Sorrow is divine. The 
crown of all crowns has been a crown of 
thorns." She goes on to say : " There are 
victorious powers in our nature, which are all 
the while working for us, in our deepest pain. 
It is said that after the sufferings of the rack 
there ensued a period when the simple repose 
from torture produced a beatific trance. It 
was a reaction of nature, asserting the benig- 
nant intentions of the Creator. So after great 
mental conflicts and agonies must come a 
reaction, and the Divine Spirit coworking 
with our spirit seizes the favorable moment, 
and carries the soul to joys beyond the ordi- 
nary possibilities of humanity." 



32 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



Mara. I know, every mother knows, it is 
so with physical pain ; but I have not experi- 
enced it in regard to mental anguish, though 
I have found a sweet peace in resignation. I 
do believe the strongest strength is that which 
endures. We honor the martyrs as much as 
the workers and preachers, — nay, more. And 
those were the noblest martyrs, who died in 
hidden dungeons, unseen and unpraised of 
men, known only to God. There are living 
martyrs now, walking cheerfully among men, 
enduring keenest suffering, because God wills 
it, with heroic patience and an acquiescence 
that is sublime. But — here is my doubt 
again — is it worth all this expenditure of 
pain ? Of what use is strength, when our 
lives are so nearly over, and our opportunities 
of doing good are so few ? 

Eireiie. Our opportunities are never gone 
while life lasts, and we never know when God 
may use us for our best and highest service. 
And do you not believe that we begin the new 
life of everlasting progression larger, wiser, 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



33 



and nobler for our discipline here ? We look 
too much at death as the end of life. It is 
only an incident in our existence. We must 
accustom ourselves to think of the Here and 
the Hereafter as the one kingdom of God. 
Why cannot we remember that we live in 
Eternity, and be patient ? And " our light 
affliction, which is but for a moment, 
worketh for us a far more exceeding and 
eternal weight of glory." 

Mara. I do not forget it. I have accepted 
sorrow as my lot. I often repeat to myself 
this stanza from Richter's " Prayer in Sick- 
ness :" — 

" Suffering is the work now sent, 
All my powers to this are bent. 
Suffering is my gain : I bow 
To my Heavenly Father's will, 
And receive it, hushed and still. 
Suffering is my worship now. 1 ' 

Eirene. I do not think you should repeat 

that yet. You are not shut up to suffering, 

by any means ; nor is it the only work sent 

you. I believe, if you search for it, you will 

3 



34 



THE WIDOWS TRUST. 



find much more and better work than brooding 
over and indulging grief. I have just been 
reading of Paul and Silas, tortured in the inner 
prison, with their feet fast in the stocks. 
Surely they, if any, could say, " Suffering is 
my worship now." But they prayed, and 
sung praises to God, and the prisoners heard 
them ; so that their praise became a blessed 
work for the good of others. Can we not 
exchange our dirges of lamentation for such 
outspoken praises of God's loving kindness 
and tender mercy as shall win others to 
Him ? 

If no work presents itself immediately, will 
you let me suggest something which has 
lately occupied my own thoughts, though as 
yet I have not found the leisure to carry it 
out? 

Have you ever studied the Bible with 
particular reference to widows ? I mean the 
incidental teachings, involved in the narratives 
of widows, in both the Old and New Testa- 
ments. These have seemed to me not only 



DE PROFUNDIS. 



35 



full of comfort and instruction, but, taken in 
order, to portray the growth of Christian 
character, under the discipline of affliction. 

You have leisure and a love for study. 
Would it not be a relief from your sorrow, and 
a way of doing good to others, if you were to 
try thus to lead them to the God of all comfort, 
through the lessons of His Word, as to His 
dealings with widows ? 

For He " comforteth us in all our tribulation, 
that we may be able to comfort them which 
are in any trouble by the comfort wherewith 
we ourselves are comforted of God." 



36 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



" TT'OR us, — whatever's undergone, 
J- Thou knowest, wiliest what is done. 
Grief may be joy misunderstood ; 
Only the Good discerns the good. 
I trust Thee while my days go on. 

Whatever's lost, it first was won ; 

We will not struggle nor impugn. 

Perhaps the cup was broken here, 

That Heaven's new wine might show more clear. 

I praise Thee while my days go on. 

I praise Thee while my days go on ; 

I love Thee while my days go on : 

Through dark and death, through fire and frost, 

With emptied arms and treasure lost, 

I thank Thee while my days go on. 

And having in Thy life-depth thrown 
Being and suffering (which are one), 
As a child drops his pebble small 
Down some deep well, and hears it fall, 
Smiling, — so I : Thy days go on." 

Mrs. Browning. 



DE PROFUNDIS. 37 



THY will be done ! God of the desolate, 
Teach me, with heart resigned and calm, 
to say, 
Thy will be done ! I know it was Thy hand 
That gave ; oh, may I see Thy hand 
Reclaiming what it graciously bestowed ! 
Quiet my murmuring thoughts, still my regrets ! 
How little I deserved my happy lot 
Should last so long ! But life is now a void. 
Void, did I say ? Forgive me, Lord ; for life 
Is full of duties still, nor without joys. 
Have I not still around me those to love, 
And lead in holy paths ? Are there no tears 
On other cheeks, that I may wipe away? 
I bear his name, and I may hear it blessed 
By grateful lips. The memory of his kind, 
Approving smile, will it not glad each hour 
Of cheerful struggle against grief and sin ? 
Guard me, and help me on my journey home, 
God of the widow and the fatherless ! 
May I forget my own, my bitter woes, 
In pouring comfort into others' breasts ; 
Far from these lips be censure or complaint ; 
And let me strive, by every lawful means, 
To hide the faults of others and my grief. 
So by my gladsome looks and happy tones, 



38 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

By sympathy in all the gentle joys 
Of young and merry hearts, may it appear 
How bright and sunny is the lot bf those 
Who have Thy love, a solace in their woes ; 
Who, clinging to Thy cross, their souls to save, 
Can look, without one shudder, towards the grave." 

Rev. W. Calvert. 

Hymns of the Ages. 




~7ir^55^* >>, t^ 



II. 

NAOMI, 

THE HOMELESS WIDOW. 



"In returning and rest shall ye be saved." — Isaiah 
xxx. 15. 

"For a small moment have I forsaken thee ; but with 
great mercies will I gather thee. In a little wrath I hid 
my face from thee for a moment ; but with everlasting 
kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy 
Redeemer." — Isaiah liv. 7, 8. 



BAXISH far from me all I love, 
The smile of friends, the old fireside ; 
And drive me to that home of homes, 
The heart of Jesus crucified. 

Take all the light away from earth, 
Take all that men can love from me, 
Let all I lean upon give way, 
That I may lean on naught but Thee." 

Faber. 



II. 



A MONG the trials incident to widowhood, 
perhaps none is felt more keenly than 
the breaking up of the home. In one 
sense, all widows are homeless : they stand 
alone in the world, missing the protection and 
love which have always shielded them ; but 
when to this loss is added that of a long- 
accustomed and beloved place of residence ; 
when one leaves the old, familiar haunts, and 
goes out among strangers, or even among 
friends, to find a new home, bereft of all that 
made home dearest ; then, indeed, the widow 
feels herself desolate and forlorn. 

Naomi seems peculiarly the type of the 
Homeless Widow. 

She had left the home of her childhood, — 
that city in the hill country of Judea, where, 



44 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

centuries later, the Ruler was to come to His 
kingdom, — and gone, with her husband and 
their two sons, to make a new home in the 
heathen country of Moab. There was a famine 
in the land of Israel, sent, as had been pre- 
dicted by Moses, in punishment for the sins' 
of the people. Doubtless, a want of faith was 
shown in thus endeavoring to escape it, and 
God's commands were forgotten, when the 
two sons of the family married the daughters 
of a heathen race. 

But the new home seemed happy and 
prosperous. They continued there ten years. 
Elimelech died ; but the widow lived on with 
her two sons and their wives, both gentle 
and affectionate in their nature. Then, at the 
end of the ten years, " Mahlon and Chilion 
died also both of them ; and the woman was 
left of her two sons and her husband. 

" Then she arose with her daughters-in-law, 
that she might return from the country of 
Moab ; for she had heard . . . how that the 
Lord had visited his people in giving them 
bread." 



NAOMI. 45 



There is no hope of sympathy, true friend- 
ship, and help for the needy, except among the 
people of the true God. In no pagan land 
was the command either given or obeyed, to 
leave the corners of the grain-field or the 
remnant of the vintage " for the stranger, the 
fatherless and the widow." 

"Then she arose . . . that she might re- 
turn." It is impossible to read this story with- 
out thinking of the parable of the Prodigal. 
" How many hired servants of my father have 
bread enough and to spare, and I perish with 
hunger ! I will arise and go to my father." 

Naomi is a widow, and childless. All her 
dependence has failed, — her " strong staff and 
beautiful rod." Bereft of love and of protec- 
tion, she is alone and poor. She " begins to 
be in want," and her heart turns to its old 
home. She will go back to the people of 
God. 

" Come, and let us return unto the Lord : 
for He hath torn, and He will heal us ; He 
hath smitten, and He will bind us up." And, 



46 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

in returning, she does not go alone. God, in 
His tender mercy, provides human solace and 
companionship for us in our grief, as well as 
spiritual healing. " She went forth out of the 
place where she was, and her two daughters- 
in-law with her ; and they went on the way to 
return unto the land of Judah." 

But she will not be selfish in her sorrow ; 
she forgets herself for the moment, in her 
interest for these two daughters, beloved both 
for the sake of the dead and for their own. 

" And Naomi said to her daughters " (per- 
haps when they had accompanied her as far 
as the Jordan, the boundary between Moab 
and Israel), " Go, return each to her mother's 
house : the Lord deal kindly with you, as ye 
have dealt with the dead, and with me. The 
Lord grant you that ye may find rest, each of 
you in the house of her husband. Then she 
kissed them ; and they lifted up their voice, 
and wept." With the free expression of grief 
common in all Eastern nations from the 
earliest times to the present, they uttered 



NA OMI. 47 

loud wailings and lamentations. Perhaps they 
sat down together, in the dust, by the wayside, 
as one may see a company of mourning women 
in that country to-day, and wailed, " Alas ! 
Alas ! " while they recounted the virtues of 
the departed, and lamented their own desolate 
condition. 

" And they said unto her, Surely we will 
return with thee unto thy people." Both 
said this at first. Naomi remonstrates with 
them, after the simple fashion of the time. 
There was little provision for unmarried women 
or widows, in the rude customs of those days. 
To ensure "rest," i.e. safety, protection, care, 
a husband and a home were needful. Their 
best chance of obtaining these was in returning 
to their parents. 

We see the unselfish sweetness of Naomi's 
character in her final words : " Nay, my 
daughters ; for it grieveth me much, for your 
sakes, that the hand of the Lord is gone out 
against me." She would not expose them to 
the difficulties and dangers which beset her 



48 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

path ; she would rather give up her last re- 
maining comfort, sympathetic companionship, 
than see them surfer with her. For her, life 
seems nearly over; they are young, let them 
be happy again, if God will. While they 
would say, We could bear it for ourselves, but 
our poor mother! How can she endure such 
desolation ? 

In this hour of parting, all the grief they 
have suffered rushes back upon them. They 
renew their lamentations. This is Naomi's 
hour of bitterness. She is in the valley of the 
shadow of death. 

It is said that in every Gethsemane there 
is a ministering angel, and Naomi finds a 
strengthening comforter in her daughter 
Ruth. 

" Orpah kissed her mother-in-law ; but Ruth 
clave unto her." Orpah goes back to appeal 
to the charity of her parents ; returning, as 
so many young widows have done, in poverty, 
to the home they forsook willingly, in the joy 
of their bridal. Of her we hear no more : 



NAOMI. 49 



but we fear that, like other heathen nations, 
the Moabites gave little consideration or 
tenderness to widows. Her mother's prayers 
followed her : " The Lord deal kindly with 
you, as ye have dealt with the dead, and with 
me." Left alone with Ruth, Naomi makes 
one more effort to discharge what seems her 
duty. " Behold, thy sister-in-law is gone back 
unto her people, and unto her gods : return 
thou after thy sister-in-law. 

" And Ruth said, Entreat me not to leave 
thee, or to return from following after thee : 
for whither thou goest, I will go ; and where 
thou lodgest, I will lodge : thy people shall be 
my people, and thy God my God. Where 
thou diest, will I die, and there will I be 
buried : the Lord do so to me, and more also, 
if aught but death part thee and me." 

Naomi's name expressed her character ; 
but she must have been not only "pleasant" 
and lovely, but loving and wise, and have 
recommended her religion in her family, or 
she would not have made a convert in her 
4 



50 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

own house, and won her daughter to her be- 
lief in the true God. Perhaps she felt confi- 
dence in the love and piety of Ruth, and was 
only putting it to this final test. At any rate, 
she no longer resisted, nor refused the comfort 
and support which God had given her. " When 
she saw that she was steadfastly minded to 
go with her, then she left speaking unto her. 
So they two went,*' in silence for the most 
part: one full of sad thoughts, yet lit up with 
a gleam of thankfulness ; the other sustained 
by new hope and courage. She was " stead- 
fastly minded:" in the margin, we read, 
" she strengthened herself." And she had 
laid hold on strength. 

We see the key to these different deci- 
sions. Orpah returned to her people and her 
gods. Ruth said, " Thy God shall be my 
God." It was not that her affectionate nature 
made it easy to change her faith, but the new 
faith which gave strength to her affection. 

Over the Jordan, past the fruitful region 
which surrounded the " City of Palm-trees," 



NAOMI. 51 



up the dreary defile, between white walls of 
limestone rock, reflecting the bright sunshine 
with a painful glare, the two women toiled on, 
— a weary way, a long day's journey, — until 
they reached Bethlehem. It would seem that 
the Moabites let them leave their country un- 
attended, and without farewell ; but, " when 
they were come to Bethlehem, all the city was 
moved about them," and among the people 
of God, they met with kindness and true 
sympathy. 

"And they said, Is this Naomi?" 
Poor, weary and faint with travel, bowed 
with the weight of sorrow, no wonder it was 
hard to recognize her! 

" And she said unto them, Call me not 
Naomi [pleasant], call me Mara [bitter] ; for 
the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with 
me. I went out full, and the Lord hath 
brought me home again empty: why then 
call ye me Naomi, seeing the Lord hath testi- 
fied against me, and the Almighty hath 
afflicted me ? " 



52 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



She acknowledges the hand of the Lord in 
her troubles, but as yet she tastes only the 
bitterness of grief. She has not the unques- 
tioning submission of Eli: " It is the Lord: 
let Him do what seemeth to Him good ; " nor 
the firm confidence of Job : " The Lord gave, 
and the Lord hath taken away ; blessed be 
the name of the Lord." 

But she is not lebellious. She could say 
with David : " I was dumb, I opened not 
my mouth ; because thou didst it; " and with 
Jeremiah: "Wherefore should a living man 
complain, a man for the punishment of his 
sins ? Let us search and try our ways, 
and turn again to the Lord. Let us lift up 
our heart with our hands unto God in the 
heavens. " 

" My heart did heave, and there came forth, < O God ! ■ 
By that I knew that Thou wast in the grief, 
To guide and govern it to my relief ; 
Making a sceptre of the rod : 
Hadst Thou not had Thy part, 
Sure the unruly sigh had broke my heart." 1 

1 George Herbert. 



NAOMI. 53 

Upon submission follows peace. God is 
better to Naomi than her fears. She has 
learned the lesson of affliction. "Thou hast 
caused men to ride over our heads ; we 
went through fire and through water : but 
Thou broughtest us out into a wealthy 
place." x 

" When thou passest through the waters, I 
will be with thee ; and through the rivers, they 
shall not overflow thee : when thou walkest 
through the fire, thou shalt not be burned." 2 
It is only the dross which is burned away: 
the fine gold comes out purified. 

We learn to pray, with the Psalmist : 
" Search me, O God, and know my heart ; 
try me, and know my thoughts ; and lead 
me in the right way, even in the way ever- 
lasting ! " 

Naomi is no longer a " homeless widow." 
Through her daughter, whom she had won to 
the true faith, she is supported in her poverty, 
and ere long is welcomed to a new home, 

1 Psalm lxvi. 12. 2 Isaiah xliii. 2. 



54 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

where her old age is spent in comfort and 
happiness. 

A beloved grandchild is given her, in place 
of the sons whom God had taken. The 
women said: "There is a son born to Naomi ; 
and they called his name Obed." And, when 
they gave her the infant, they said : " Blessed 
be the Lord, which hath not left thee this 
day without a kinsman, that his name may 
be famous in Israel. And he shall be unto 
thee a restorer of thy life, and a nourisher of 
thine old age ; for thy daughter-in-law, which 
loveth thee, which is better to thee than seven 
sons, hath borne him." 

To the Eastern mind, no stronger expres- 
sion could be used to denote the preciousness 
of this beloved daughter. 

How God blesses us in and through our 
afflictions! We suffer the consequences of 
our mistakes and the punishment of our 
sins ; yet He over-rules them all for our good 
and His own glory. His very chastisements 
prove His love. " I know, O Lord, that Thy 



KA OMI. 



55 



judgments are right, and that Thou in faith- 
fulness hast afflicted me." 

" Sorrow may endure for a night ; but joy 
cometh in the morning." 




$6 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



'"T^ARKER than night, life's shadows fall 
-A—/ around us, 

And like benighted men we miss our mark ; 
God hides Himself, and grace hath scarcely 
found us, 
Ere death finds out his victims in the dark. 

Onward we go ; for still we hear them singing, 
Come, weary souls ! for Jesus bids you come ! 

And through the dark, its echoes sweetly ringing, 
The music of the Gospel leads us home. 

Far, far away, like bells at evening pealing, 
The voice of Jesus sounds o'er land and sea ; 

And laden souls, by thousands meekly stealing, 
Kind Shepherd! turn their weary steps to 
Thee. 

Rest comes at length j though life be long and 
dreary, 
The day must dawn, and darksome night be 
past ; 
All journeys end in welcomes to the weary, 
And heaven, the heart's true home, will come 
at last." 

Faber. 



III. 



RUTH. 



THE WIDOW TURNING TO GOD IN 
AFFLICTION. 



" Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me, My Father, 
Thou art the Guide of my youth ? " — Jeremiah iii. 4. 

"Hearken, O daughter, . . . and incline thine ear; forget 
also thine own people, and thy father's house. So shall the 
King greatly desire thy beauty : for He is thy Lord ; and 
worship thou Him." — Psalm xlv. 10, 11. 

" Return unto me ; for I have redeemed thee." — Isaiah 
xliv. 22. 

"The redeemed of the Lord shall return, and come 
with singing unto Zion ; and everlasting joy shall be upon 
their head : they shall obtain gladness and joy ; and sor- 
row and mourning shall flee away." — Isaiah li. 11. 



^ 



^ 



"I will trust in the covert of Thy wings." 

FATHER, beneath Thy sheltering wing 
In sweet security we rest, 
And fear no evil earth can bring, 
In life, in death, supremely blest. 

For life is good, whose tidal flow 
The motions of Thy will obeys ; 

And death is good, that makes us know 
The Love divine that all things sways. 

And good it is to bear the cross, 
And so Thy perfect peace to win ; 

And naught is ill, nor brings us loss, 
Nor works us harm, but only sin. 

Redeemed from this, we ask no more, 
But trust the love that saves to guide : 

The grace that yields so rich a store 
Will jrrant us all we need beside." 



III. 

TN the hour of her deepest affliction, Ruth 
came to the decision to cast in her lot 
with the people of God. She would not re- 
turn with Orpah to her heathen home. She 
knew too well the sad lot of a widow in a 
heathen land. But the quiet example of 
Naomi, her unselfish sweetness of character, 
her submissiveness in sorrow, perhaps also 
the example of her lost husband, led this 
young widow to the resolution : " Thy people 
shall be my people, and thy God my God." 
" God washes the eyes with tears, that they 
may behold the land where tears shall come 
no more." He takes away our frail human 
supports, that we may find the everlasting 
arms about us ; He lets us walk in darkness, 
that we may learn to cling to His guiding 



62 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

hand ; He deprives us of our dearest treas- 
ures, that we may find in Him our all ; He 
breaks up our earthly homes, that our hearts 
may find their rest in Him. 

In her new home, — perhaps some humble 
shelter granted by the kindness of friends, 
perhaps the old residence which Naomi and 
her family had forsaken, in going to Moab, — 
Ruth enters at once upon the duty of support- 
ing her aged mother. It was in the begin- 
ning of barley-harvest when they came to 
Bethlehem. Barley was sown in the autumn, 
and was the first crop to ripen in the spring, 
not long after the time when the feast of the 
passover was celebrated. "And Ruth the 
Moabitess said unto Naomi, Let me now go 
to the field, and glean ears of corn after him 
in whose sight I shall find grace. And she 
said unto her, Go, my daughter." 

The Israelites had been forbidden to gather 
the gleanings of their harvest, or to go back 
after a sheaf forgotten in the field, or wholly 
to reap the corners of the field ; they were not 



RUTH. 63 

to go over the boughs of the olive-tree a sec- 
ond tirrre, or to glean the grapes after the vin- 
tage : it was to be left for the stranger, the 
fatherless and the widow, that the Lord might 
bless them in all the work of their hands. 
This beautiful provision was intended not only 
to teach them beneficence, but to be a con- 
stant reminder of their deliverance from 
Egyptian bondage. They were forbidden to 
oppress the stranger. " For ye know the 
heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers 
in the land of Egypt." 

Ruth had a double claim : she was a 
stranger and a widow. So " she went, and 
came, and gleaned in the field after the reap- 
ers ; and her hap was to light on a part of 
the field belonging unto Boaz." This was a 
kinsman of Naomi's husband, Elimelech, who 
is described as " a mighty man of wealth." 
They belonged to a princely family in the 
tribe of Judah ; but the wealth, as often hap- 
pens, was unequally distributed: Boaz had 
an abundance, while Elimelech's widow was 
reduced to poverty. 



64 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

It was a matter of pure chance, we should 
say, that Ruth, going out with other- women 
to glean, should happen upon the field belong- 
ing to Boaz ; for it does not seem to have oc- 
curred to Naomi to solicit aid from her rich 
kinsman. Is there such a thing as chance ? 
" The lot is cast into the lap ; but the whole 
disposing thereof is of the Lord." 

The fields lay all about the hills, which 
were covered with the closely built, walled 
town. Bethlehem must have shone in white- 
ness then as now, built of the limestone which, 
under a thin layer of soil, forms all these 
Judean hills. These fields are separated from 
each other, not by hedges or fences as with 
us, but by a boundary of stones placed at 
some distance apart. To move these stones 
would not have been a difficult thing to do ; 
but it was one of those forbidden under a 
curse. " Cursed be he that removeth his 
neighbor's land-mark." There were and are 
no dwellings among the fields, except for 
temporary shelter during the time of harvest 



RUTH. 6$ 

or vintage, near the threshing-floor or the 
wine-press. For safety from wild beasts or 
wilder men, the inhabitants gathered in towns 
or villages. 

Boaz came down from Bethlehem, and 
passed with courteous greetings among his 
reapers. " The Lord be with thee," and 
"The Lord bless thee," were customary forms 
of salutation ; and the Arab inhabitants of 
Palestine preserve similar expressions of pious 
courtesy. 

Boaz sees a strange, sweet face among the 
gleaners, and asks, " Whose damsel is this ?" 

" And the servant that was set over the 
reapers answered, It is the Moabitish damsel 
that came back with Naomi out of the 
country of Moab. And she said, I pray you, 
let me glean and gather after the reapers 
among the sheaves." 

Her humble manner of soliciting permission 

has won the favor of this upper servant. 

Everybody in Bethlehem knows Ruth's story, 

and has sympathy with her ; Boaz too, as 

5 



66 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

presently appears. " Then said Boaz unto 
Ruth, Hearest thou not, my daughter ? Go not 
to glean in another field, neither go from 
hence, but abide here fast by my maidens. 
Have I not charged the young men that they 
shall not touch thee ? and when thou art 
athirst, go unto the vessels, and drink of that 
which the young men have drawn." 

The drinking vessels of porous clay, which 
keep the water cool, are familiar to all who 
have travelled in the East. Probably the 
water was brought from Bethlehem ; for there 
are few wells in the fields lying around, and 
the water in those is not always good ; while 
there is no sweeter water in Palestine than 
that of the famous well in Bethlehem, the 
water for which David longed, — David's 
well they call it, to this day. 

In surprise at his greeting, Ruth bowed her- 
self to the ground, and said unto him, " Why 
have I found grace in thine eyes, that thou 
shouldest take knowledge of me, seeing I am 
a stranger?" 



RUTH. 67 

" Boaz answered, It hath fully been shewed 
me, all that thou hast done unto thy mother- 
in-law since the death of thine husband ; and 
how thou hast left thy father and thy mother, 
and the land of thy nativity, and art come 
unto a people which thou knewest not here- 
tofore. The Lord recompense thy work, and 
a full reward be given thee of the Lord God 
of Israel, under whose wings thou art come 
to trust." 

The shadowing wings, protecting care, 
brooding love, — how often we meet this sym- 
bol of God's tenderness for His people ! " How 
excellent is thy loving kindness, O God ! 
Therefore the children of men put their trust 
under the shadow of Thy wings." " My soul 
trusteth in Thee ; in the shadow of Thy 
wings will I make my refuge, until these 
calamities be overpast." " Because thou hast 
been my help, therefore in the shadow of Thy 
wings will I rejoice." 

Troubles drive us to this refuge ; then we 
find help, and rejoice in our trust. 



68 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

" How safe, how calm, how satisfied 
The soul that clings to thee ! " 

Ruth's grateful humility in acknowledging 
the kindness of Boaz increases his regard for 
her. He invites her to share the simple meal 
of the reapers, — " Eat of the bread, and dip 
thy morsel in the vinegar," and himself reaches 
her parched corn ; and afterwards charges 
his reapers not to molest her, but to let her 
glean even among the sheaves, and to drop 
some of the handfuls on purpose for her, and 
rebuke her not. " So she gleaned until even, 
and beat out that she had gleaned; and it was 
about an ephah of barley." Up the stony, 
steep path to Bethlehem she toiled, bearing 
the welcome burden of her gleaning, — about 
a bushel of our measure, — and was met by con- 
gratulations from Naomi. " Where wroughtest 
thou ? Blessed be he that did take knowl- 
edge of thee ! " 

Is this only Eastern courtesy, or a token of 
the sweetness of Naomi's nature, breathing 
blessings on one who had befriended her daugh- 



RUTH. 69 

ter, before she knew his name ? The blessing is 
repeated with emphasis, when she learns that 
it is Boaz : " Blessed be he of the Lord, who 
hath not left off his kindness to the living and 
to the dead." " Thine own friend, and thy 
father's friend forsake not." How tenderly we 
think of those who have been kind to our dead ! 
"And Naomi said unto her, The man is 
near of kin to us, one of our next kinsmen." 
The margin reads : " One that hath a right 
to redeem." By the law, the kinsman might 
redeem a possession sold by " a poor brother," 
or the brother himself, if he had been sold 
into servitude for debt. " The land shall not 
be sold for ever ; for the land is mine, for ye 
are strangers and sojourners with me. And 
in all the land of your possession ye shall 
grant a redemption for the land." Although 
" the Law made nothing perfect," it was a 
beautiful foreshadowing of the Gospel. In 
Job's words of confident belief, " I know that 
my Redeemer liveth," he appeals to the 
" Living Kinsman," of whom the earthly kins- 



70 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



man is but a symbol. ■ " Forasmuch as the 
children are partakers of flesh and blood, He 
also himself likewise took part in the same," 
that He might redeem us from our bondage. 

Boaz was a near kinsman. But he was a 
rich man, and Naomi was very poor. Perhaps 
she waited for him to make the first advances. 
There was a still nearer kinsman ; possi- 
bly she knew the fact. If she had any plan 
in her mind, she was not premature in disclos- 
ing it. 

Boaz was busy with his harvest. After the 
ripening of the barley would follow the rye 
and the wheat. He had invited Ruth to 
glean with his maidens until all the harvest 
was ended. This she repeats to her mother, 
and Naomi says : " It is good, my daughter, 
that thou go out with his maidens, that they 
meet thee not in any other field." It was 
well for the young widow that she could earn 
her bread in this safe, sheltered manner, ex- 
posed to no rudeness or unkindness. " So 
she kept fast by the maidens of Boaz to glean 



RUTH. . " " 71 

unto the end of barley-harvest and of wheat- 
harvest ; and dwelt with her mother-in-law." 

When the harvest was over, and the harvest 
feast was held, Naomi proposed her plan to 
Ruth : My daughter, " shall I not seek rest 
for thee, that it may be well with thee ? " 
With confidence in her judgment, Ruth 
replies, " All that thou sayest unto me I 
will do." Following her mother's advice, and 
the custom of the Jews with reference to 
widows, she appeals to Boaz for the protection 
of his name. " Spread thy skirt over thy 
handmaid ; for thou art a near kinsman," — 
" one that hath a right to redeem." 

In his reply, Boaz expresses both respect 
and affection for Ruth. " Blessed be thou of 
the Lord, my daughter ; for thou hast shewed 
more kindness at the latter end than at the 
beginning, inasmuch as thou followedst not 
young men, whether poor or rich. And now, 
my daughter, fear not ; I will do to thee all 
that thou requirest : for all the city of my 
people doth know that thou art a virtuous 
woman." 



72 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



He allows the justice of her claim ; but there 
is a nearer kinsman, who must first be con- 
sulted. " If he will not do the part of a kins- 
man to thee, then will I ... as the Lord liveth." 

The scene at the gate of the city, next day, 
gives us another carious glimpse of Eastern 
customs at that early age. Boaz sits down in 
the open space at the gate, the town-hall or 
court-room of those times ; and, when the 
kinsman of whom he had spoken comes by, 
he calls him aside. He selects ten of the 
elders of the city, and lays the case before 
them, in accordance with the law, as recorded 
in the book of Deuteronomy. When a man 
died without children, his brother, or nearest 
kinsman, was to marry the widow, and her 
first-born son was to succeed to the name 
and estate of the dead, " that his name be 
not put out of Israel." 

The kinsman was ready to redeem the land 
that had belonged to Elimelech, but not to 
marry Ruth the Moabitess, lest he should 
mar his own inheritance. In accordance with 



RUTH. 73 

the custom prescribed, but already changed 
by omitting the humiliating part (Deuter- 
onomy xxv. 7-10), he draws off his shoe, and 
gives it to his neighbor, saying to Boaz, " Buy 
it for thee." 

" And Boaz said unto the elders, and unto all 
the people, Ye are witnesses this day, that I 
have bought all that was Elimelech's, and all 
that was Chilion's and Mahlon's, of the hand 
of Naomi. Moreover, Ruth the Moabitess, 
the wife of Mahlon, have I purchased to be 
my wife, to raise up the name of the dead 
upon his inheritance, that the name of the 
dead be not cut off from among his brethren, 
and from the gate of his place : ye are wit- 
nesses this day." 

" And all the people that were in the gate, 
and the elders, said, We are witnesses," and 
added blessings and congratulations. 

This would seem to be the civil ceremony 
of marriage. What religious services, if any, 
were added at that early day, we know not. 
" Boaz took Ruth, and she was his wife." 



74 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

Her first-born son was given to Naomi, as her 
peculiar property, for a " kinsman," whose name 
should be "famous in Israel," for " a restorer 
of her life, and a nourisher of her old age." 

Thus Ruth the Moabitess became the an- 
cestress of David the King, and of David's 
greater Son. 

To the stranger who "joined himself to the 
Lord," to keep His Sabbaths and take hold of 
His covenant, was promised " a place and a 
name better than of sons and of daughters." 
"I will give them an everlasting name, that 
shall not be cut off. Also the sons of the 
stranger that join themselves to the Lord, 
to serve Him, and to love the name of the 
Lord, to be His servants ; . . . even them 
will I bring to my holy mountain, and make 
them joyful in my house of prayer, their burnt 
offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted 
upon mine altar ; for mine house shall be 
called an house of prayer for all people." 1 
The Jews received constant lessons that they 

1 Isaiah lvi. 3-7. 



RUTH. 75 

were not the exclusive people of God, but 
that," in every nation, he that feareth Him and 
worketh righteousness is accepted with Him." 

In the genealogy of Jesus Christ are men- 
tioned four women : first, Tamar, who was a 
Canaanite ; then, Rahab of Jericho, the wife of 
Salmon and mother of Boaz ; Ruth the Moa- 
bitess ; and she that had been the wife of 
Uriah the Hittite, and probably herself a 
Hittite. The Messiah expected by the Jews 
was to be the Redeemer of the world.^ " Other 
sheep I have, which are not of this fold." 

Of most of the ancestors of Christ, we have 
the history more or less fully recorded in the 
Old Testament. None of their errors or sins 
are concealed. Kings, good and evil, are in 
the line : Ahaz, Manasseh, Amon, as well as 
Asa, Jehosaphat, Jotham, Hezekiah,and Josiah. 
Does this not teach us that He took upon 
Himself our human nature, with its inheritance 
of weakness and susceptibility to temptation, — 
" In all points tempted like as we are, yet 
without sin" ? And as He conquered, so we, 
through I lis Spirit, may conquer. 



76 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

When we see the sweetness of true woman- 
hood in Ruth, simple, tender, submissive, yet 
cheerful and energetic, in all her history as 
daughter, wife, and mother ; when we think of 
her unselfish devotion, her sweet humility, not 
hesitating at the lowest service for the support 
of her mother and herself, — we are tempted 
to ask, What has been gained, in all these 
years of culture and development, in real 
beauty and strength of character? 

We think of her in her new home, fulfilling 
larger duties and trusts with the same faith- 
fulness and sweetness ; like the " virtuous 
woman " of the Proverbs, " whose price is 
above rubies." She is "a crown to her hus- 
band," and his " heart doth safely trust in her." 
" She will do him good and not evil all the 
days of her life." " Her children arise up, 
and call her blessed." 1 

Sorrow is a test of character. Times of 
affliction are times of decision. God chastens 
us not for His pleasure, but for our profit : 

1 Prov. xii. 4; xxxi. 10, 1 1, 12, 28. 



RUTH. 77 

we are not the creatures of a blind chance, or 
the subjects of a capricious tyrant, but the 
children of a wise and loving Father. If we 
accept our chastisement at His hand, and 
submit to His will, sorrow shall work in us 
the peaceable fruits of righteousness. The 
submissive soul asks, " Lord, what wilt Thou 
have me to do?" And, when this point is 
reached, the soul meets its Saviour. 

We have heard much about the worship of 
sorrow: " Sorrow is noble, sorrow is divine ;" 
but sorrow in itself, unless accepted as coming 
from the hand of God, has not a tendency to 
elevate, but rather to harden and lower the 
character. It is an old saying, " The same fire 
that softens gold hardens clay ; " and grief 
does not leave us where it finds us. An 
unsanctified affliction is a fearful thing. 

To the widow, who in the hour of bitterest 
grief has begun to feel the need of support 
and consolation which nothing earthly can 
yield, let the example of Ruth speak. 

Come, like her, and seek refuge under the 



78 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



" shadowing wings." For your lost home, 
you shall find a new home among His people, 
and hearts filled with the tenderest love and 
sympathy. Do you, like Ruth, seek " rest " ? 
Jesus says, " Come unto me, all ye that are^| 
weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest." 

Ruth found a kinsman, " one who had a^ 
right to redeem." Our Redeemer liveth. He 
has a double right to redeem : First, the rig-Hi 
of a kinsman. " As the children are partakers 
of flesh and blood, He also himself likewise 
took part of the same." Secondly, He has the 
right of purchase. By the sacrifice of Himself, 
He has made eternal redemption for us. " I 
am He that blotteth out thy transgressions for 
mine own sake, and will not remember thy 
sins." " Return unto me; for I have redeemed 
thee." 

Ruth sought the protection of Boaz in some 
uncertainty as to whether her claim would be 
acknowledged by him ; but there is no uncer- 
tainty in coming to Christ. He never broke 
His promise, never failed the soul that trusted 



RUTH. 79 

Him. We know that " He is faithful and just 
to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from 
all unrighteousness." Oh, yield yourself to 
this Redeemer ! When you hear Him saying, 
" I have redeemed thee, thou art mine," 
hesitate not to claim Him in return as your 
Saviour. " Lord, I am Thine : save me ! " 

Ruth found a safe shelter, a happy home, — 
protection, love, and peace. What the soul 
finds in Christ, how can we begin to say? 

" He is a path, if any be misled ; 
He is a robe, if any naked be ; 
If any chance to hunger, He is bread ; 
If any be a bondman, He is free ; 
If any be but weak, how strong is He ! 
To dead men life He is, to sick men health, 
To blind men sight, and to the needy wealth : 
A pleasure without loss, a treasure without stealth." 

Giles Fletcher. 



80 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



" I am Christ's, and Christ is mine." 

" T ONG did I toil, and knew no earthly rest ; 
J— ' Far did I rove, and found no certain home ; 
At last I sought them in His sheltering breast 
Who opes His arms, and bids the weary come. 
With Him I found a home, a rest divine \ 
And I since then am His, and He is mine. 

Yes, He is mine ! and naught of earthly things, 
Not all the charms of pleasure, wealth, or power, 
The fame of heroes, or the pomp of kings, 
Could tempt me to forego His love an hour. 
Go, worthless world, I cry, with all that's thine ! 
Go ! I my Saviour's am, and He is mine. 

The good I have is from His stores supplied ; 
The ill is only what He deems the best ; 
He for my friend, I'm rich with naught beside, 
And poor without Him, though of all possest. 
Changes may come ; I take or I resign : 
Content while I am His, while He is mine. 

Whate'er may change, in Him no change is seen 
A glorious sun, that wanes not nor declines : 
Above the clouds and storms He walks serene, 
And sweetly on His people's darkness shines ; 



RUTH. 8 1 

All may depart ; I fret not nor repine, 
While I my Saviour's am, while He is mine. 

He stays me falling, lifts me up when down, 
Reclaims me wandering, guards from every foe, 
Plants on my worthless brow the victor's crown, 
Which, in return, before His feet I throw ; 
Grieved that I cannot better grace His shrine, 
Who deigns to own me His, as He is mine. 

While here, alas ! I know but half His love, 
But half discern Him, and but half adore ; 
But when I meet Him in the realms above, 
I hope to love Him better, praise Him more ; 
And feel, and tell, amid the choir divine, 
How fully I am His, and He is mine." 

Henry Francis Lyte. 



iw4^< 



IV. 



THE WIDOW OF SAREPTA. 



^%^ik^ 



" The Lord is my portion, saith my soul ; therefore will 
I hope in Him." — Lamentations iii. 24. 

"Behold the eye of the Lord is upon them that fear 
Him, upon them that hope in His mercy ; to deliver their 
soul from death, and to keep them alive in famine." — 
Psalm xxxiii. 18, 19. 

44 Blessed is he that considereth the poor : the Lord will 
deliver him in time of trouble. 

" The Lord will preserve him, and keep him alive; and 
he shall be blessed upon the earth." — Psalm xli. 1, 2. 

"And ye shall eat in plenty, and be satisfied, and praise 
the name of the Lord your God, that hath dealt wondrously 
with you." — Joel ii. 26. 





Ifllll'®! 



"ELIJAH AT SAREPTA." 

LO, cast at random on the wild sea sand, 
A child low wailing lies : 
Around, with eye forlorn and feeble hand, 

Scarce heeding its faint cries, 
The widowed mother in the wilderness 
Gathers dry boughs, their last sad meal to bless. 

But who is this that comes with mantle rude 

And vigil-wasted air ? 
Who to the famished cries, " Come, give me food, 

I with thy child would share ! " 
She bounteous gives ; but hard he seems of heart, 
Who of such scanty store would crave a part. 



Haply the child his little hand holds forth, 

That all his own may be. 
Nay, simple one, thy mother's faith is worth 

Healing and life to thee. 
That handful given, for years insures thee bread ; 
That drop of oil shall raise thee from the dead. 



86 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

For in yon haggard form He begs unseen, 

To whom for life we kneel : 
One little cake He asks, with lowly mien, 

Who blesses ever}- meal. 
Lavish for Him, ye poor, your children's store, 
So shall your cruse for many a day run o'er." 

Keble. 



* 



if* 



IV. 



r I A HE word of the Lord came to Elijah, in 
his hiding-place in the wild ravine of 
the Wady Cherith, near the Jordan, where 
the brook was dried up because there had 
been no rain in the land : " Arise, get thee to 
Zarephath, which belongeth to Zidon, and 
dwell there : behold, I have commanded a 
widow woman there to sustain thee." 

A rich widow, doubtless, we should say, 
pausing here, — into whose heart God has put 
compassion for His servant, for whom in all 
the land of Israel there is no safe resting- 
place from the pursuit of Ahab and Jezebel. 
Wait, and see. 

Elijah obeys, traversing the land of Israel 
in safety to the city on the sea-shore, half 
way between Tyre and Sidon. One may see 
the ruins of it still, though the modern Sa- 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



repta, or Sarafend, is a little village on the 
hill, which rises abruptly from the beach, a 
little to the left. In the time of the crusades, 
the city was still upon the shore, and a chapel 
was erected over the reputed house of the 
widow. 

Arrived at Zarephath, Elijah finds a woman 
near the gate, gathering sticks, probably drift- 
wood from wrecks, upon the sandy shore. Ke 
does not ask to be taken to her house, because 
God has sent him to be her guest ; nor does 
he ask at first for food. Weary and thirsty 
after his long journey, he begs only for the 
cup of cold water which a child may give, 
but which in this time of drought and famine 
is a precious boon. 

This widow has a generous disposition, or 
suffering has made her tender-hearted: she 
will not leave the stranger to linger by the 
wayside, athirst, while she can bring water; 
and the kindness of her heart is shown in the 
alacrity with which she starts to fetch it. As 
she was going, he calls to her, as if the 



THE WIDOW OF SAREPTA. 89 

thought of his hunger had but just occurred 
to him, and bread was no more to ask than 
water : " Bring me, I pray thee, a morsel of 
bread in thine hand." 

Her sad, sad answer shows the hopeless- 
ness with which she faces the horrors of 
death by starvation. For herself, she could 
bear it ; but she has an only son, and how 
can she bear to see this evil come upon him ! 

" As the Lord thy God liveth, I have not a 
cake, but an handful of meal in a barrel, and a 
little oil in a cruse ; and behold, I am gather- 
ing two sticks, that I may go in and dress it 
for me and my son, that we may eat it, and 
die." 

This widow is not an idolater, though liv- 
ing in a heathen land. No worshipper of 
Baal would have said, " As the Lord thy God 
liveth." Does she recognize Elijah as the 
stern prophet who had threatened Ahab with 
this sore drought and famine ; or was it only 
from his rough garment and leathern girdle, 
the familiar garb of a prophet, that she knew 
him for an Israelite and a " man of God " ? 



9 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



"And Elijah said unto her, Fear not; go 
and do as thou hast said : but make me thereof 
a little cake first, and bring it unto me, and 
after make for thee and for thy son. 

" For thus saith the Lord God of Israel, The 
barrel of meal shall not waste, neither shall 
the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the 
Lord sendeth rain upon the earth." 

Will she trust the prophet, and believe his 
strange promise, when so many of the 
chosen people of God have fallen into un- 
belief and idolatry ? 

"She went and did according to the saying 
of Elijah ; and she, and he, and her house, did 
eat many days. And the barrel of meal 
wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, 
according to the word of the Lord." 

It has been said that this was the time of 
the widow's conversion; but it seems more 
probable that she was already a believer in 
the true God ; that she had been, perhaps for 
a long time, a prayerful and trusting servant 
of the Lord, one of His hidden ones; else 



THE WIDOW OF SAREPTA. 91 

would He have singled her out as the recipi- 
ent of such a blessing ? " I tell you of a 
truth," said Christ to the unbelieving people 
of Nazareth, " many widows were in Israel in 
the days of Elias, when the heaven was shut up 
three years and six months, and great famine 
was throughout all the land ; but unto none of 
them was Elias sent, save unto Sarepta, a city 
of Sidon, unto a woman that was a widow." 
Like that other woman of " great faith," who 
followed the Master along these " coasts of 
Tyre and Sidon," who stood the severest test 
of her confidence in His power and love, 
this widow was one of His own. "In every 
nation he that feareth Him and worketh 
righteousness is accepted with Him." Let 
us beware of making God's word narrow by 
our narrowness : " Is He the God of the 
Jews only ? is He not also of the Gentiles ? " 
"The Lord God which gathereth the outcasts 
of Israel saith, Yet will I gather others to 
him, besides those that are gathered unto 
him." 1 

1 Isaiah lvi. 8. 



92 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

Prompt obedience, Showing faith in the 
promise of God, has been added to the kind- 
ness with which she received His messenger. 
She is becoming worthy to entertain an angel 
unawares, and to minister to one whom God's 
angels were sent to serve. She now enjoys, 
as do all who give to the Lord through His 
poor, the blessing both of giving and receiv- 
ing at the same time. The more you draw 
from the fountain of love, the more love and 
joy — the inseparable companion of love — 
flow in to enrich the soul. It shall be " a 
well of water, springing up into everlasting 
life." 

After the first great act of faith and self- 
denial, all becomes easy. She gladly prepares 
the second meal for the prophet, now that she 
has tasted and seen that the Lord is good, 1 
and found that He is not slack concerning 
His promises. 2 She must daily have felt that, 
while others were pining in famine, she was 
living on the finest of the wheat ; that her cup 

1 Psalm xxxiv. 8. 2 2 Peter iii. 9. 



THE WIDOW OF SAREPTA. 93 

was running over ; that she was like those 
who were fed with manna, and ate angels' food. 
It seems also that her generous nature ex- 
pands by giving. In her despair, she was 
about to bake a little cake for herself and her 
son, that they might eat once more, and die. 
Now, we read that she, and the prophet, and 
her house, did eat many days ; or, as the mar- 
gin has it, a full year. Her servants, or her 
relatives, or her poorer neighbors, are wel- 
comed to a share of her abundance. 

Except for the destitution caused by the 
famine, she was not in circumstances of abject 
poverty. She was the mistress of a household, 
and possessed one of the better class of dwell- 
ings. The word translated " loft " in our 
version, as the chamber of the prophet, is 
"alliyeh" in the Hebrew, still the common 
Arabic word for the pleasant upper room, or 
place of honor given to guests, in Eastern 
houses. The same word describes the " little 
chamber on the wall " (or roof), prepared for 
Elisha by the rich Shunamite. These pleas- 



94 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

ant upper rooms, opening often through 
arched corridors upon the flat roofs of the 
houses, are more retired than the lower apart- 
ments, which are occupied by the women and 
servants of the family, and were appropriate 
for the resting-places of prophets. 1 

The stern prophet, then, was the honored 
guest of the widow during a year, and possi- 
bly two years, of famine. 

" We learn from heathen records," says 
Dean Stanley, in his " History of the Jewish 
Church," " that this famine was long remem- 
bered in Phoenicia, and that solemn prayers 
were offered up, in the temples of Astarte, 
by Ethbaal, King of Tyre, for the descent of 
rain upon the earth." What a lesson for 
the heathen friends and neighbors of this 
widow was the life of faith and prayer and 
constant dependence upon the promises of 
God, which went on in her dwelling ! Truly, 
it was a light shining in a dark place. What 
choice companionship had she secured, during 

1 The Land and the Book. Wm. M. Thomson, D.D. 



THE WIDOW OF SAREPTA. 95 

these many months, when there was neither 
dew nor rain ! The poor widow lives under 
the immediate care of the Almighty, Omnis- 
cient Father, and has come into daily commun- 
ion with the Infinite Spirit. Let us then open 
our doors with generous faith and obedient ser- 
vice ; let us " use hospitality without grudg- 
ing" ! Not only may we entertain angels 
unawares, — the King's servants, — but to 
the open heart the King Himself shall enter. 
" If any man hear my voice, and open the 
door, I will come in to him, and will sup with 
him, and he with me." 1 

To him that hath shall be given. Having 
proved herself an apt learner in God's school, 
this widow is to receive another lesson. As 
her faith did not fail, nor her obedience waver, 
under this severe test, she is again to be sor- 
row-taught ; for, poor widow though she be, 
she is to be one of the world's teachers to the 
end of time. The boy who has been so long 
miraculously sustained by God-given bread, 

1 Revelations iii. 20. 



g6 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

and whose life must have seemed precious in 
the sight of the Lord, to her great surprise 
and dismay, falls sick and dies. 

Now, she is not only a widow, but child- 
less ; for the little one, who busied and cheered 
her lonely hours, can no longer prattle in her 
ear, and divert her from her gloom. When 
the cheerful voices are hushed, and the dear, 
familiar footsteps are heard no more, how 
terrible is the stillness ! 

"And she said unto Elijah, What have 
I to do with thee, O thou man of God ? art 
thou come unto me to call my sin to remem- 
brance, and to slay my son ? " 

When God comes especially near to the 
soul by His providences, an overwhelming 
sense of sin is often the result. " Depart 
from me," said Peter, in his astonishment at 
Christ's miracles ; " for I am a sinful man, O 
Lord." The first thought, in great affliction, 
is that God is punishing us for something in 
the past. Naomi said, " The Lord hath testi- 
fied against me." Even Job, though con- 



THE WIDOW OF SAREPTA. 97 

scious of integrity, and stoutly defending his 
uprightness against the aspersions of his 
friends, confesses : " I have sinned ; what 
shall I do unto Thee, O Thou preserver of 
men ? " 2 "I have heard of Thee by the hear- 
ing of the ear : but now mine eye seeth 
Thee : wherefore I abhor myself, and repent 
in dust and ashes." 2 

Those of us who have listened to Mendels- 
sohn's Oratorio of Elijah remember the 
plaintive wail of the childless widow : " Help 
me, man of God ! my son is sick ! and his 
sickness is so sore that there is no breath 
left in him. I go mourning all the day long ; 
I lie down and weep at night. See mine 
affliction ! Be thou the orphan's helper ! " 

And he said, " Give me thy son. And he 
took him out of her bosom," — for she yet clung 
to the little lifeless form, — oh, how hard it 
is to let them go out of our arms into 
Death's ! — " and carried him up into a 
loft, where he abode, and laid him upon 

1 Job vii. 20. 2 Ibid. xlii. 5, 6. 

7 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



his own bed. And he cried unto the Lord, 
and said, O Lord my God, hast thou also 
brought evil upon the widow with whom I 
sojourn, by slaying her son ? And he 
stretched himself upon the child three times, 
and cried unto the Lord, and said, O Lord 
my God, I pray thee let this child's soul come 
into him again. And the Lord heard the 
voice of Elijah ; and the soul of the child came 
into him again, and he revived. And Elijah 
took the child, and brought him down out 
of the chamber into the house, and delivered 
him unto his mother : and Elijah said, See, 
thy son liveth." 

" And the woman said to Elijah, Now by 
this I know that thou art a man of God, and 
that the word of the Lord in thy mouth is 
truth." 

I know. Faith had become certainty. 

" Rabbi, said Nicodemus, we know that 
Thou art a teacher come from God, for no 
man can do these miracles that Thou doest, 
except God be with him." 



THE WIDOW OF SAREPTA. 99 

" We have heard him ourselves ; " said the 

Samaritans, " and know that this is indeed 

the Christ, the Saviour of the world." 

" I know, is all the mourner saith, 
Knowledge by suffering entereth, 
And life is perfected by death." 

Is it not worth while to suffer, to obtain 
such precious knowledge ? 

Of the subsequent life of this widow, we 
are told nothing ; but it would seem that 
Elijah remained in her dwelling, until, "after 
many days," the word of the Lord came to 
him in the third year of the famine, saying, 
" Go, shew thyself unto Ahab ; and I will send 
rain upon the earth." 

The rescued son of the widow is identified 
in very old Jewish traditions with the boy 
who was with Elijah on Mount Carmel, and 
was sent to watch for the little cloud which 
was the sign of the promised rain, and whom 
he left at Beersheba, when he went into the 
wilderness and to Mount Horeb ; with the 
youth who was sent to anoint Jehu, 1 and with 

1 2 Kings ix. I. 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



the prophet Jonah, who is called by Dean 
Stanley " the first apostle, though involun- 
tary and unconscious, of the Gentiles ; repay- 
ing, in his mission of mercy and pity to the 
Assyrian Nineveh, the mercy and pity 
which his mother had shown to the Israelite 
wanderer." 

If this tradition be well founded, we see 
the mother giving up to the service of God 
the child whose life He had redeemed from 
death. Like Hannah, she could say : " For this 
child I prayed ; and the Lord hath given me 
my petition which I asked of Him : therefore 
also I have lent him to the Lord ; as long as 
he liveth he shall be lent to the Lord." l 

Beside the lesson, "The Lord will provide," 
usually drawn from the story of this widow, 
another is suggested : how much, under God's 
blessing, is often accomplished by people of 
very limited resources. There never was a 
great quantity of oil or meal, apparently, — 
a little in the cruse, a handful in the bottom 



1 i Sam. i. 27, 28. 



THE WIDOW OF SAREPTA. 101 

of the barrel, — but the generous heart made 
it welcome to all, and there was enough for 
all : it never failed. Although so limited in 
appearance, this widow's resources were in- 
finite. She drew upon Omnipotence. 

Is not the lesson of this story, and that of 
the multiplication of the widow's oil, the same, 
to some extent, which we draw from the 
miracles of Christ in feeding the thousands ? 
" The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness 
thereof." " The silver and the gold are 
His." Why should we care to call any thing 
our own ? Our Father has enough for all His 
children. 

We pray, " Give us this day our daily 
bread ;" and, if He takes us at our word, shall 
we begin to fret about to-morrow ? 

" My God shall supply all your need." 

If He wishes us to give to others, He can 
furnish the means ; if He has work for us to 
do, He can give us strength. "And God is 
able to make all grace abound toward you ; 
that ye, always having all sufficiency in all 
things, may abound to every good work." 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



"It is more blessed to give than to receive." 

IS thy cruse of comfort wasting? Rise, and 
share it with another, 
And through all the years of famine it shall 
serve thee and thy brother. 

Love Divine will fill thy storehouse, or thy 

handful still renew : 
Scanty fare for one will often make a royal feast 

for two. 

For the heart grows rich in giving ; all its wealth 

is living grain ; 
Seeds, which mildew in the garner, scattered fill 

with gold the plain. 

Is thy burden hard and heavy ? do thy steps 

drag wearily ? 
Help to bear thy brother's burden, God will bear 

both it and thee. 

Numb and weary on the mountains, wouldst 

thou sleep amidst the snow? 
Chafe that frozen form beside thee, and together 

both shall slow. 



THE WIDOW OF SAREPTA. 103 

Art thou stricken in life's battle ? Many wounded 

round thee moan : 
Lavish on their wounds thy balsams, and that 

balm shall heal thine own. 

Is the heart a well left empty ? None but God 

its void can fill ; 
Nothing but a ceaseless Fountain can its ceaseless 



Is the heart a living power ? Self-entwined, its 

strength sinks low : 
It can only live in loving, and by serving love 

will grow." 

Mrs. Charles. 



THE WIDOW IN DEBT. 



" God is our refuge and strength, a very present help 
in trouble." — Psalm xlvi. i. 

" A little that a righteous man hath is better than the 
riches of many wicked." 

" I have been young, and now am old ; yet have I not 
seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread." 
Psalm xxxvii. 16, 25. 

" In the day when I cried Thou answeredst me, and 
strengthenedst me with strength in my soul." 

"Though I walk in the midst of trouble Thou wilt re- 
vive me : Thou shalt stretch forth Thine hand against the 
wrath of mine enemies, and Thy right hand shall save me." 
Psalm cxxxviii. 3, 7. 



T 



HE child leans on its parent's breast, 
Leaves there its cares, and is at rest ; 

The bird sits singing by his nest, 
And tells aloud 

His trust in God, and so is blest 
'Neath every cloud. 



He has no store, he sows no seed, 
Yet sings aloud, and doth not heed ; 
By flowing stream or grassy mead, 

He sings to shame 
Men, who forget, in fear of need, 

A Father's name. 

The heart that trusts for ever sings, 
And feels as light as it had wings ; 
A well of peace within it springs : 

Come good or ill, 
Whate'er to-day, to-morrow brings, 

It is His will." 

Isaac Williams. 



V. 



TN the history of the prophet Elisha, we find 
frequent reference to the " Sons of the 
Prophets." 

There were many prophets during the reign 
of Ahab, who gained their living by assisting 
in idolatrous worship : " prophets of Baal four 
hundred and fifty, and the prophets of the 
groves four hundred, which eat at Jezebel's 
table;" but these had been slain by Elijah, 
at the brook Kishon. 

It was God's vengeance, deserved by their 
own idolatry, and a just return for the cruelty 
of the wicked queen, who had cut off the 
prophets of the Lord. 

At this time, the governor, or steward over 
the royal household, was a man who " feared 
the Lord greatly." As there were saints in 



HO THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

Caesar's household, so the good Obadiah lived 
in that wicked court, and kept his integrity. 
When Jezebel slew the prophets of the Lord, 
he took an hundred of them, and hid them by 
fifty, in a cave, and fed them with bread and 
water through that time of famine and peril. 
* For I Thy servant fear the Lord from my 
youth," he had said to Elijah. 

After the destruction of the prophets of 
Baal, these hidden ones seem to have emerged 
from their seclusion, and with others, among 
the " seven thousand " who had not bowed 
the knee to Baal, they formed a class known 
as the " Sons of the prophets." There was a 
company of them at Bethel, and another at 
Jericho, where, after the translation of Elijah, 
fifty strong men of them sought for three 
days to find his mortal remains. They were 
gathered together, perhaps, something like a 
band of pious monks in a convent, only that 
celibacy was not practised ; and spent part of 
their time in receiving instructions from the 
older prophets among them, and thus fit- 



THE WIDOW IN DEBT. 



ting themselves to become teachers of the 
people. 

After the translation of Elijah, his mantle 
rested upon his servant Elisha, whom God had 
appointed to be prophet in his stead. Evi- 
dences of God's presence with him were not 
wanting ; miracles were wrought in answer 
to his prayers. After a short residence in 
Jericho, — when he healed the waters of the 
spring, still known as the " Fountain of 
Elisha," — he went up to Bethel, and from 
thence to Mount Carmel, and Samaria, which 
appears to have been his usual residence. 

" Now there cried a certain woman of the 
wives of the sons of the prophets unto Elisha, 
saying, Thy servant my husband is dead ; and 
thou knowest that thy servant did fear the 
Lord : and the creditor is come to take unto 
him my two sons to be bondmen." 

Jewish traditions, both of the Rabbins and 
the Chaldee paraphrast, followed by Josephus 
in his History of the Jews, represent this 
woman as the widow of Obadiah, and add 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



that he had contracted this debt through his 
generous support of the Lord's prophets, 
during the famine. If so, he may have lost 
his place in the household of Ahab, and have 
died in poverty, leaving no means for the pay- 
ment of the debt. 

If we reject this tradition, — as Obadiah is 
not called a prophet in our version, and we 
may think it improbable that one of that class 
should have occupied the post of steward in 
the household of Ahab, — the case is not 
materially altered. The widow of a good man, 
a faithful servant of God, is left in circum- 
stances of great distress, under a heavy debt, 
which she has no means of paying. Perhaps 
her husband had incurred this debt impru- 
dently ; perhaps, during those years of drought 
and famine, it was unavoidable, and, if his 
life had been spared, it would have been hon- 
orably discharged. A sudden death often 
leaves the affairs, even of those in good cir- 
cumstances, in a sadly involved condition ; 
and hasty settlements, compelled by impatient 



THE WIDOW IN DEBT. 113 

creditors, prove a source of great trial, if not 
of actual injustice, to the widow and fatherless. 
The exacting creditor had come to this poor 
woman, with the cruel demand that she should 
give up her two sons, more precious now in 
her widowhood, and upon whose labor she, 
perhaps, relied wholly for support, to be sold 
into slavery for seven years, that this debt 
might be paid. The law given by Moses 
allowed a man to be sold, or to sell himself, 
into service for seven years ; but all Hebrew 
bondmen were to be released in the year of 
Jubilee ; all debts were then discharged ; even 
purchased fields returned to their original 
owners. The servants thus secured were to 
be like ordinary hired servants. " Ye shall 
not rule over one another with rigor. . . . For 
unto me the children of Israel are servants, 
they are my servants whom I brought forth 
out of the land of Egypt : I the Lord your 
God." l The poor were to be relieved ; 
money was to be lent without usury; the 

1 Lev. xxv. 53, 55. 



114 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

greatest freedom in giving was always to 
be shown : " Thou shalt open thine hand wide 
unto thy poor brother, and shalt surely lend 
him sufficient for his need. " Even if the 
seventh year, the year of release, were at hand, 
" thou shalt surely give, and thine heart shall 
not be grieved when thou givest unto him : 
because that for this thing the Lord shall bless 
thee in all thy works, and in all that thou 
puttest thine hand unto." When a Hebrew 
servant went out free, in the seventh year, he 
was not to be sent away empty. " Thou shalt 
furnish him liberally out of thy flock, and out 
of thy floor, and out of thy wine-press ; of that 
wherewith the Lord thy God hath blessed 
thee thou shalt give unto him." 1 

They were to be the servants of God, and 
a nation of brothers. The spirit of the Law 
was the spirit of the Gospel : Christ came not 
to destroy, but to fulfil. " Thou shalt love the 
Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy 
neighbor as thyself ; " " For One is your 

1 Deut. xv. 8, io, 13, 14. 



THE WIDOW IN DEBT. 115 

Master, even Christ ; and all ye are brethren ; " 
" Give to every man that asketh of thee ;" " Do 
good, and lend, hoping for nothing again ; " 
" Give, and it shall be given unto you." 

What a power the Jewish Church would 
have been, among the heathen nations, if they 
had been faithful to the spirit of their Law, 
and retained the unity of a great family of 
brethren, under the Fatherhood of God ! 

What a power the Christian Church might 
be, if the spirit of the Gospel ruled in com- 
pleteness ! 

But when the Jewish nation forsook the 
Lord and served Baalim, the duty of love and 
pity and beneficence to the poor was soon 
forgotten. They became a nation of oppres- 
sors and wrong-doers, " they sold the right- 
eous for silver, and the poor for a pair of 
shoes ; " they " despised the law of the Lord, 
and kept not His commandments ;" they 
afflicted the just, they took bribes, and turned 
aside the poor in the gate from their right. 1 

1 Amos ii. 6: v. 12. 



Il6 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

In the prophecies of Isaiah and Jeremiah, 1 
and in the story of Nehemiah, we have ac- 
counts of the perversion of this custom ; and 
the parable of the unmerciful servant shows 
that the practice of selling debtors, with their 
wives and children, into bondage, was not an 
unusual thing in the time of Christ. 2 

It is noticeable that this distressed widow 
did not appeal to the pity of the worldly or 
the charity of the righteous : she went directly 
to God Himself, through His prophet. 

She remembered the promise of the Lord : 
" Ye shall not afflict any widow or fatherless 
child. If thou afflict them in any wise, and they 
cry at all unto me, I will surely hear their cry." 

She took God at His word, and her faith 
was justified. The plan of relief is immediate. 
God shows her how to help herself. " And 
Elisha said unto her, What shall I do for thee ? 
Tell me, what hast thou in the house ? And 
she said, Thine handmaid hath not any thing 
in the house save a pot of oil. Then he said, 

l Jer. xxxiv. S, iS. 2 Neh. v. 1-9 ; Matt, xviii. 25. 



THE WIDOW IN DEBT. WJ 

Go, borrow thee vessels abroad of all thy 
neighbors, even empty vessels ; borrow not a 
few. And when thou art come in, thou shalt 
shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons, 
and shalt pour out into all those vessels, and 
thou shalt set aside that which is full." 

She is not to be idle. Having borrowed 
the empty vessels of her neighbors, whose 
curiosity is sure to be excited by this unusual 
proceeding, she is to shut herself in, with her 
children and her God. Those indifferent and 
perhaps unbelieving outsiders cannot know 
all that passes between her and her Divine 
Friend, nor in what strange ways He soothes 
and consoles her troubled spirit She is to 
employ all her remaining resources, to bring 
all her energies to bear ; herself to lift and 
pour out the oil, and then God aids by His 
miraculous power. She pours out all she 
possesses, and there is a fresh supply, and 
that as long as she continues to drain the 
cruse. She fills every vessel which she had 
provided. " And it came to pass when the 



Il8 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

vessels were full, that she said unto her son, 
Bring me yet a vessel. And he said unto 
her, There is not a vessel more. And the oil 
stayed." Doubtless, she could have poured 
out more oil, if she had provided more vessels. 
She was not straitened in God, but in her 
own expectations and hopes. 

It has been suggested that, had Abraham 
continued to pray for Sodom, had he pleaded, 
Wilt thou not save the city for the sake of 
one righteous ? he might possibly have pre- 
vailed. His petitions were granted just as 
long as he continued them. So with us : we 
are afraid to ask great things for ourselves 
and others ; therefore, we receive small things. 

" Thou art coming to a king : 
Large petitions thou shouldst bring." 

" Then she came and told the man of God. 
And he said, Go, sell the oil, and pay thy debt, 
and live thou and thy children of the rest." 

There was more than enough to satisfy the 
creditor. Not only were the widow's sons 



THE WIDOW IN DEBT. 119 

redeemed from bondage , but there was 
enough to support them all. 

If she were indeed the widow of Obadiah, 
the bread which he had dispensed to the 
starving prophets of the Lord was richly 
returned to his own family. 

" Bread shall be given him ; and his waters 
shall be sure." 1 

" Cast thy bread upon the waters ; for thou 
shalt find it after many days." 

The psalms of David must have been fa- 
miliar to the sons of the prophets, and how 
full of promises to the afflicted, to the father- 
less and the widow, to the "seed of the right- 
eous " ! How must this widow's heart have 
sung for joy! "I sought the Lord, and He 
heard me, and delivered me from all my fears. 
O taste and see that the Lord is good : blessed 
is the man that trusteth in Him. O fear the 
Lord, ye his saints ; for there is no want to 
them that fear Him. The eyes of the Lord 
are upon the righteous, and His ears are open 
1 [saiah xxxiii. 16; Ecclesiastes xi. 1. 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



unto their cry. The righteous cry, and the 
Lord heareth, and delivereth them out of 
all their troubles. The Lord redeemeth the 
soul of His servants ; and none of them that 
trust in Him shall be desolate." 1 

It may seem strange to us that the widow 
of a good man should be suffered to come to 
such extremities. She pleaded with Elisha, 
" Thou knowest that Thy servant did fear the 
Lord ; " and yet, notwithstanding his piety, she 
is reduced to this distress. It may have been 
to show her, and to teach us, more clearly, 
God's power and love for her, in her relief. 
God nowhere promises to keep His people 
from affliction: on the contrary, "many are 
the afflictions of the righteous ; but the Lord 
delivereth him out of them all." 2 Their 
troubles shall not harm them. " There shall 
no evil happen to the just." And " They 
that seek the Lord shall not want any good 
thing." 3 

1 Ps. xxxiv. 4, S, 9, 15, 17, 22. 2 Ps xxxiv I9 

3 Ps. xxxiv. TO. 



THE WIDOW IN DEBT. 



" For the Lord is a sun and shield [a light 
in darkness, a defence in trouble] : the Lord 
will give grace and glory : no good thing will 
He withhold from them that walk uprightly." 

Perhaps some poor widow may say, " My 
case is similar to this : my husband was a 
servant of God," — perhaps a minister, who 
died suddenly and left her involved in debt, 
or long, wasting illness laid him aside from 
service, and his substance wasted with his 
life. l< Can I expect miraculous assistance?" 
No : you cannot expect miracles, in the ordi- 
nary sense of the word ; but you may expect 
mercies, and signal mercies, if your love and 
faith abound. Are you truly the Lord's, and 
do you commit all your interests to Him ? 
As sure, then, as He is a covenant-keeping 
God and true to His word, He will sustain 
you, and make all things to work for your 
good. 

He will give you power to work for the 
support of yourself and children, and open 
ways in which you can maintain them, if they 



122 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

are young and dependent upon you ; so that 
you need not be separated from them. This 
widow was not called to give up the society 
and the help of her sons. God provided not 
only for the payment of her debt, but for the 
support of herself and her children. People 
sometimes, from the kindest motives, seek to 
aid a poor widow by " relieving " (that is the 
word they use, but " depriving" would express 
it more truly) her of one or more of her chil- 
dren. There are exceptional cases ; but it 
seems as if a widow ought never to be advised, 
far less compelled, to give up her children, 
unless she is manifestly unfit for their care. 
God has given them to her ; they should be 
her best consolation in her widowhood ; no 
one else can fill to them a mother's place. 
Let His people help them to remain together, 
help her to labor for their support. I know 
of cases where the efforts of a widow to bring 
up and educate a large family of children 
have been manifestly blessed of God, and her 
sacrifices richly rewarded. 



THE WIDOW IN DEBT. 1 23 

If a widow is left helpless and dependent, 
too feeble to labor, and without natural sup- 
porters, God can raise up friends and helpers 
for her. Let her trust in Him, and despair 
not. " When the poor and needy seek water, 
and there is none, and their tongue faileth for 
thirst, I the Lord will hear them, I the God 
of Israel will not forsake them. I will open 
rivers in high places, and fountains in the 
midst of the valleys : I will make the wilder- 
ness a pool of water, and the dry land springs 
of water." 

" They shall not hunger nor thirst ; neither 
shall the heat nor sun smite them : for He 
that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even 
by the springs of water shall He guide them." 1 

" He that cometh to me shall never hunger ; 
and he that believeth on me shall never 
thirst." 2 

1 Isaiah xli. 17, 18; xlix. 10. 2 John vi. 35. 



124 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



1 T EAVE God to order all thy ways, 
-*— ' And hope in Him, whate'er betide, 
Thou'lt find Him, in the evil days, 

Thy all-sufficient strength and guide ; 
Who trusts in God's unchanging love 

Builds on the rock that naught can move. 

What can these anxious cares avail, 
These never-ceasing moans and sighs ? 

What can it help us to bewail 
Each painful moment as it flies ? 

Our cross and trials do but press 
The heavier for our bitterness. 

Only thy restless heart keep still, 
And wait in cheerful hope ; content 

To take whate'er His gracious will, 
His all-discerning love hath sent. 

Doubt not our inmost wants are known 
To Him who chose us for His own. 

He knows when joyful hours are best, 
He sends them as He sees it meet ; 

When thou hast borne the fiery test, 
And art made free from all deceit, 

He comes to thee, all unaware, 

And makes thee own His loving care. 



THE WIDOW IN DEBT. 1 25 

All are alike before His face, 
Tis easy to our God most high 

To make the rich man poor and base, 
To give the poor man wealth and joy. 

True wonders still by Him are wrought 

Who setteth up, and brings to nought. 

Sing, pray, and swerve not from His ways, 

But do thy own part faithfully ; 
Trust His rich promises of grace, 

So shall they be fulfilled in thee. 
God never yet forsook at need 
The soul that trusted Him indeed." 



Lyra Germanica. 



Neumarck, 1653. 




-*5 



¥ 



VI. 

ANNA: 

THE AGED WIDOW, WAITING FOR 
REDEMPTION. 



" I have waited for Thy salvation, O God ! " — Genesis 
xlix. iS. 

"O God, Thou hast taught me from my youth ; and 
hitherto have I declared Thy wondrous works. 

" Now also, when I am old and gray-headed, O God, for- 
sake me not ; until I have shewed Thy strength unto this 
generation, and Thy power unto every one that is to come." 
Psalm lxxi. 17, iS. 

" Those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall 
flourish in the courts of our God. 

" They shall still bring forth fruit in old age." — Psalm 
xcii. 13, 14. 

" Even to hoar hairs will I carry you." — Isaiah xlvi. 4. 



THE HIDDEN LIFE. 

"Your life is hid with Christ in God." — Col. iii. 3. 

OH ! there are some who, while on earth they 
dwell, 
And seem to differ little from the throng, 
Already to the heavenly choir belong, 
And even here the same sweet anthem swell ; 
They joy, at times, with 'joy unspeakable,' 
Pouring to Him they love their heartfelt song ; 
While to behold Him ' face to face ' they long, 
As the parched traveller for the cooling well. 
Ask you how such from others may be known ? 
Mark those whose look is calm, their brow 

serene, 
Gentle their words, love breathing in each tone, 
Scattering rich blessings all around, unseen. 
They draw each hour, from living founts above, 
The streams they pour around, of peace and 

joy and love." 

Charlotte Elliott. 



VI. 



TT was no unusual occurrence, in the temple 
at Jerusalem, for a young mother to pre- 
sent her first-born son to the Lord, with the 
offering of a pair of doves, or two young 
pigeons, suitable to her humble station. But 
when Joseph and Mary brought in the child, 
Jesus, to do for Him after the custom of the 
law, an aged man, "just and devout," who 
waited for the consolation of Israel, and to 
whom it had been revealed that he should not 
die before he had seen the Lord's Anointed, 
came by the Spirit into the temple, and, taking 
the child in his arms, blessed God, and said, 
u Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart 
in peace, according to Thy word ; for mine 
eyes have seen Thy salvation." 



132 THE WIDOWS TRUST. 

While Joseph and Mary marvelled at the 
words of Simeon, and his prophecy of mingled 
joy and sorrow, an aged woman entered, 
" coming in that instant ; " and she likewise 
"gave thanks unto the Lord, and spake of 
Him to all them that looked for redemption 
in Jerusalem." There were others present, 
doubtless, though their names are not re- 
corded, who, like Simeon and Anna, were 
waiting and looking for the Redeemer, the 
Living Kinsman, the Consolation and the 
Hope of Israel. Like the faithful few, men- 
tioned in the Book of Malachi, these waiting 
ones "spake often one to another; and the 
Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of 
remembrance was written before Him for 
them that feared the Lord, and that thought 
upon His name." 1 Coming into the temple, 
as their habit was at the hour of prayer, they 
found in the child Jesus the Lord's Christ. 

Anna, the prophetess, was well known in 
the temple. So constant was her attendance 

1 Mai. iii. 16. 



ANNA. 133 

here, so faithful her observance of all relig- 
ious services and duties, that it was said of 
her: " she departed not from the temple ; but 
served God with fastings and prayers night 
and day." She was a widow of over eighty 
years, who, since the seven years oi* her early 
married life, had been so devoted to the service 
of God, that her home was in His house. Hers 
was the blessing that the Psalmist craved: 
" One thing have I desired of the Lord, that 
will I seek after ; that I may dwell in the 
house of the Lord all the days of my life, to be- 
hold the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in 
His temple." "Blessed are they that dwell in 
Thy house ; they will be still praising Thee." 1 
From their humble homes, where little op- 
portunity for privacy could be enjoyed, these 
saints came up to the temple, with its Beauti- 
ful Gate and spacious courts, where three 
times in the day devout Jews gathered for 
prayer. " Evening, and morning, and at noon 
will I pray, and cry aloud ; and He shall hear 

1 Psalm xxvii. 4; and lxxxiv. 4. 



134 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



my voice." 1 Some, like the Pharisee, prayed, 
to be seen of men ; others, like the Publican, 
prayed, " God, be merciful to me a sinner ; " 
while others, like Simeon and Anna, found the 
home of their souls in the House of God, and 
the natural expression of their feelings in 
prayer and praise. If they " served God with 
fastings " also, we may be sure that it was such 
fasting as the prophet Isaiah commended : "to 
deal bread to the hungry, to undo heavy bur- 
dens, and let the oppressed go free." 

In her youth and middle life, Anna could 
serve God more actively. Now, in extreme 
age, there seems little left for her to do. 
Waiting in the temple, she has seen strong 
and active men die in the prime of life, and 
the midst of usefulness. Priests who offered 
sacrifices for the people, Levites who led the 
service of praise, have slipped away from her 
side, and have gone to their reward. Her 
children and grandchildren, it may be, have 
grown up, and no longer need her services. 

1 Psalm lv. 17. 



ANNA. 135 

Some of them, no doubt, have passed away 
before her : she feels it far better than to be 
here. Perhaps she wonders why her Father 
does not grant her desires, and come and re- 
ceive her unto Himself ; but she can wait. 
She would not venture to choose for herself ; 
for she knows that God's time is the best 
time, that she has something still to do or 
suffer : and, instead of longing and praying 
that she may join the sainted dead, she fills 
up the time with most earnest supplication 
for the salvation of others and for the coming 
of the Messiah. 

For not only among those waiting souls 
in the temple at Jerusalem, but throughout 
Palestine and the neighboring nations, even 
in the distant East, there was the expectation 
of the Ruler, the Prince, the Anointed of God, 
who should shortly appear for the deliverance 
of His people. They doubtless prayed, as do 
the blinded and desolate Jews in their wail- 
ing-place outside the old walls of the temple 
enclosure : — 



136 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

" O Lord ! in our day, in our day send Thy 
salvation ! " 

They prayed not in despair, but in hope ; 
" looking for redemption." 

Standing between the old world and the new, 
the night and the morning, they were the first 
to welcome the brightness of the dawn, and 
were permitted to share in the work of pre- 
paring the way before the feet of the Messiah. 

Anna is not too aged to testify of Christ. 
Venerated as she is for her great age and 
long-tried piety, she can do much to lead 
others to faith in the Infant Redeemer. She 
must have been happy in her prayers, and in 
her testimony for Jesus. She could not have 
been lonely and sad, with such surroundings 
and such employments. After years of 
patient waiting on the Lord, she sees the ful- 
filment of His promises, and her last days are 
her best days. From the temple on earth 
she is translated to the temple in heaven ; as 
one passing from one room to another of the 
Father's House. 

"How beautiful," says one, "is the sight of 



A XX A. 137 

a pilgrim sitting by heaven's gate, looking np 
with longing eyes, — anxiously, prayerfully, 
yet patiently, — hoping each time the door 
opens it is for him ! " 

Waiting thus in the land of Beulah, as 
Anna waited in the temple ; praying as she 
prayecl, " Thy kingdom come ! " — these aged 
saints are a link between earth and heaven ; 
and when they pass into that upper temple, 
whence they shall go no more out, we behold the 
glory shining through the open door, and our 
hearts follow them with new faith and hope. 

Such an aged widow I have in mind, who 
has recently been called to her heavenly 
home. She had spent a long life of piety as 
the beloved and honored wife of a faithful 
servant of God ; she had brought up children 
for the Lord's service, and passed many a 
sleepless hour in prayer for their conversion ; 
she had seen three of her sons pass away, not 
without hope in their death ; she had minis- 
tered to the saints, and while health and 
Strength lasted had diligently followed every 
good work ; finally, her companion and guide 



138 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

had fallen at her side, and she was left "a 
widow indeed, and desolate." In the years 
that remained, her feeble health confined her 
for much of the time to her own home, and, 
for the last four months, to her chamber. 

It was always the " chamber of peace." 
Cheerful, patient, prayerful, she waited for 
her Lord's coming. And, at last, the door 
was opened, and she passed through, so quickly, 
so peacefully, that the waters of the dark 
river scarcely touched her feet. 

Waking from slumber, with a smile, she said : 
"Why, I thought I was dreaming!" and in a 
moment she was beyond all earthly dreams. 

Was it the faces of her beloved ones who 
had returned to meet her, or had her eyes 
beheld the King in His beauty ? 

" No shadow of death on thy pathway, no river in 
struggle to cross ; 

No anguish or trial of parting, no moment to pic- 
ture a loss : 

But, in one happy instant, the angel who carries the 
golden key 

Hath unlocked the wonderful portals, and opened all 
heaven to thee ! " 



ANNA. 139 

" Oh, soothe us, haunt us, night and day, 
Ye gentle spirits far away, 
With whom we shared the cup of grace, 
Then parted : ye to Christ's embrace, 
We to the lonesome world again ; 
Yet mindful of th' unearthly strain 
Practised with you at Eden's door, 
To be sung on, where angels soar, 
With blended voices, evermore." 

The example of Anna appeals especially to 
aged widows ; but also to all who are laid 
aside by sickness or infirmity from the active 
employments of life, helpless, and dependent 
upon others. " Why am I left to linger 
here," asks such an one, "when I can do 
nothing more for Christ, and am only a bur- 
den upon my friends ? " 

If your work were done, God would take 
you home. Because you are left to linger, 
you may be sure He has still something 
for you to do. None are too old or feeble 
to speak of Jesus ; to offer the sacrifice of 
prayer and praise ; to set an example of 
patient cheerfulness in weakness and suffer- 



140 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

ing. There is no witness for the truth of 
Christianity like the living example. In how 
many households is the presence of some 
patient sufferer — in her own sensitive esti- 
mate utterly useless, "the least of all saints " 
— a constant evangel of faith and hope ! 

Like the souls under the altar, slain for the 
Word of God and for His testimony, these, 
too, are witnesses for the truth ; and they 
shall rest/ and white robes shall be given 
them, when their mission is accomplished. 

Perhaps God keeps you here to pray for 
others. 

In the service of prayer, from which none 
are shut out, women have prevailed with God 
to gain even miraculous blessings. How can 
we know but that some obscure woman may 
yet accomplish wonders by her intercessions, 
may gain a Samuel for the Church, or pre- 
serve a Moses, or restore dead souls to life ? 

In a country parish, a revival of religion 
began, so quietly, so unexpectedly, that pastor 
and people were taken by surprise. "Who 



ANNA. 141 

has been praying for this revival ? " asked the 
pastor, in his thoughts ; and the question 
was answered, unconsciously, by one of his 
people, a near neighbor of a lame, helpless 
old man, who was mighty in prayer : " I 
knew there would be a revival ; for I have 
heard Father C.'s earnest prayers, day after 
day." 

A beautiful passage in Montalembert's 
" Monks of the West " describes the value, 
too little appreciated, of the Religious Houses 
as homes of unceasing prayer. Before these 
altars rose the pure incense of Christian wor- 
ship, and intercessory prayer for those ab- 
sorbed in worldly duties, for those in danger 
and temptation, for the ignorant and weak 
and helpless. 

But the abolition of Religious Houses in so 
many countries has not ended the offering. 
From the Christian Church universal rises 
incessantly the incense of prayer. 

The praying soul is never alone. Her con- 
fession is, " Lo, there are many with me ! " 



142 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

God turned the captivity of Job, when he 
prayed for his friends. So when we forget 
our own sorrows, and lose ourselves in inter- 
cession for others, we find ourselves lifted up 
in the spirit into the great family of believers, 
the cloud of witnesses, the general assembly 
and church of the first-born, enrolled in 
heaven. " Part of the host have crossed the 
flood ; " but does it matter so much on which 
side of the " narrow stream " we are resting ? 
" To die is gain," but " to live is Christ." 

It is good that we should " both hope and 
quietly wait for the salvation of God." 



ANNA. 143 



" O OMETIMES I long for promised bliss ; 
^-^ But it will not come too late, — 
And the songs of patient spirits rise 

From the place wherein I wait ; 
While in the faith that makes no haste 

My soul has time to see 
A kneeling host of Thy redeemed, 
In fellowship with me. 

There is a multitude around, 

Responsive to my prayer ; 
I hear the voice of my desire 

Resounding everywhere. 
But the earnest of eternal joy 

In every prayer I trace ; 
I see the glory of the Lord 

On every chastened face. 

How oft, in still communion known, 

These spirits have been sent 
To share the travail of my soul, 

Or show me what it meant ! 
And I long to do some work of love, 

No spoiling hand could touch, 
For the poor and suffering of Thy flock 

Who comfort me so much. 



144 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

But the yearning thought is mingled now 

With the thankful song I sing ; 
For Thy people know the secret source 

Of every precious thing. 
The heart that ministers for Thee 

In Thy own work will rest ; 
And the subject spirit of a child 

Can serve Thy children best. 

Mine be the reverent, listening love, 

That waits all day on Thee, 
With the service of a watchful heart, 

Which no one else can see, — 
The faith that in a hidden way, 

No other eye may know, 
Finds all its daily work prepared, 

And loves to have it so. 

My heart is resting, O my God, 

My heart is in Thy care, — 
I hear the voice of joy and health 

Resounding everywhere. 
'Thou art my portion,' saith my soul, 

Ten thousand voices say, 
And the music of their glad Amen 

Will never die away." 

Miss Waring. 



VII. 



THE WIDOW AGAIN BEREAVED. 



"The Lord hath comforted His people, and will have 
mercy upon His afflicted." — Isaiah xlix. 13. 

"I, even I, am He th.it comforteth you." — Isaiah li. 12.. 

"A man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.'' — 
Isaiah liii. 3. 

" Blessed are they that mourn : for they shall be com- 
forted." — Matthew v. 4. 

" He hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted." — Luke 
iv. 18. 

" And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." 
Revelations xxi. 4. 



^ 



" 'Tis sweet, O Lord, to know 
Thy kindredness with woe ! " 

THY compassionate ' Weep not ! ' 
On this our tearful earth once heard, 
For every age with comfort fraught, 
Tells how Thy heart is ever stirred. 

And, therefore, when Thy touch arrests 
The bearers of that bier at Nain, 

Warm on unnumbered hearts it rests, 
Though yet their dead live not again." 

Mrs. Charles. 



^zl^i^s^ 




VII. 



TN the early days of Christ's ministry, not 
long after the wonderful day of miracles 
at Capernaum, — when He had healed the 
centurion's servant, and the leper, and the 
mother of Peter's wife, and many who were 
vexed with evil spirits, and others who were 
sick, — He came with His disciples and a 
throng of interested and curious followers to 
" a city called Nain." As they approached 
the gate of the city, they were met by a 
funeral procession. " There was a dead man 
carried out, the only son of his mother, and 
she was a widow ; and much people of the 
city was with her." 

Nain was a small place, and the widow was 
well known, and had many friends who shared 



150 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

her grief, and did what they could to show 
their sympathy ; like those who came to 
mourn and weep with Martha and Mary, after 
the death of their brother. " And when the 
Lord saw her, He had compassion on her, 
and said unto her, Weep not." 

Her friends had mingled their unavailing 
tears with hers. Who is this stranger who 
dares to say, " Weep not " ? Can he restore 
the dead to life ? She lifts her tear-blinded 
eyes to the compassionate face of Jesus. He 
has touched the bier, and the bearers stand 
still. " And He said, Young man, I say unto 
thee, Arise. 

" And he that was dead sat up, and began to 
speak ; and He delivered him to his mother." 

Absorbed in her sorrow at the illness and 
death of her only son, the widow of Nain may 
have heard of none of the miracles of healing : 
of the sick restored to health, of the lepers 
cleansed, of the little daughter of Jairus 
given back, from the gates of the grave, to her 
sorrowing parents. She may not even have 






THE WIDOW AGAIN BEREAVED. 151 

known that the Hope of Israel, the Desire 
of all nations, had yet appeared in the world. 
Certainly she had not faith which believed 
that this particular blessing was to be granted 
to her ; for she does not appear to have asked 
for it, or to have even thought of calling upon 
Christ for aid. Probably her head was so 
bowed with grief, and her eyes so dimmed 
with tears, that she did not even notice His 
approach, until He spoke, and said to her, 
" Weep not." 

Christ did not recount, with grateful appre- 
ciation, as in the case of others, the services 
she had rendered, or evidences of love and 
'faith she had shown : as when He said, " This 
woman, since the time I came in, hath not 
ceased to kiss my feet ; " and of another, " She 
hath anointed me for my burial ; " nor did He 
praise her as He did the Syrophcenician, " O 
woman, great is thy faith ; " or the poor widow, 
" Of a truth I say unto you, that this poor 
widow hath cast in more than they all." 
No: this marvellous blessing seems to have 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST 



been bestowed upon the widow of Nain solely 
on account of her extreme distress, because 
she was a desolate widow, bereaved of her 
only son. " When the Lord saw her, He had 
compassion on her." He looked into the depths 
of her desolated, broken heart. He knew how 
fathomless was her love for this lost child ; 
how she was in bitterness, as one is in bitter- 
ness for an only son. 

She had reached the age when one most 
pines for love, companionship, and care. This 
son may have been quite devoted to her, and 
have given her undivided affection ; for no 
wife appears in the procession. She may 
have depended upon him for support ; he was 
the only human prop upon which she leaned, 
the comfort of her declining years. Now, 
bereft of all human support and comfort, she 
feels herself left alone, in a cold world, to go 
down to her grave uncared for. " If I be 
bereaved of my children, I am bereaved." 

There may have been something peculiarly 
touching in her grief ; but is not the sorrow 



THE WIDOW AGAIN BEREAVED. I 53 

of every such widow enough to move a sym- 
pathetic heart ? The tender Saviour could 
not look upon her, unmoved. With Him, to 
pity was to relieve. She has met Christ, for 
the first time, as have so many others, at a 
burial, or beside a tomb. He has shown 
Himself her friend ; He can wipe all tears 
from her eyes. He did not address the crowd : 
He spake kind, comforting words to the 
stricken widow, bade her weep no more, and 
delivered the dead son alive to his mother. 

Upon the people, who had seen this miracle, 
there fell a fear ; " and they glorified God, 
saying, That a great prophet is risen up among 
us ; and, That God hath visited His people." 

We are told nothing more of Christ's visit 
to Nain ; but surely, after such proof of His 
divine power, the people must have come to 
Him with all their troubles, bringing their 
sick to be healed. The wondrous story of 
Capernaum must have been repeated, and as 
then there was great joy in that city, so in 
Nain, " the blind see, the lame walk, the 



154 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead 
are raised, to the poor the gospel is preached." 

Of the joy in the home of the widow, who 
can speak ? Must she not have opened her 
house, with her heart, to the Saviour, and 
counted herself thrice blessed, if allowed to 
minister to His need ? 

Stricken widow, crushed to the earth, and 
beaten down by the great storm of sorrow, do 
the clouds gather again in blackness, and break 
over your head ? Has the son of your love, 
your pride and hope, your only remaining sup- 
port and comfort, been removed from you? 
Or have the little clinging arms, whose tender 
touch about your neck so soothed your sorrow, 
been unloosed, and straightened for the grave, 
and are you left not only a widow, but child- 
less ? Do you say, — 

" I clo not pray : ' Comfort me ! comfort me ! ' 

For how should comfort be ? 
O, — O that cooing mouth, — that little white head ! 
No; but I pray, If it be not too late, 

Open to me the gate, 
That I may find my babe when I am dead. 



THE WID O IV A GA IN BEREA VED. 1 5 5 

Show me the path. I had forgotten- Thee, 

When I was happy* and free, 
Walking down here in the gladsome light o 1 the sun ; 
But now I come and mourn ; O set my feet 

In the road to Thy blest seat, 
And for the rest, O God ! Thy will be done." l 

If grief has brought you to this mind, you 
are learning the lesson God has set you in the 
school of affliction. 

" Till God shall make our very spirits poor, 
We shall not up to highest wealth aspire." 

It may be that in no other way than by taking 
from us our dearest treasures could He draw 
us to Himself. 

As the Alpine shepherds lead the sheep 
to higher and sweeter pastures by taking the 
lambs there first, so our Good Shepherd 
gathers the lambs in His arms and carries 
them in His bosom, and thus allures us to 
heights we would never climb, if left to our- 
selves. 

1 Jean Ingelow. 



156 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

" When on my ear your loss was knelled, 
And tender sympathy upburst, 
A little spring from memory welled, 

Which once had quenched my bitter thirst. 

And I was fain to bear to you 

A portion of its mild relief, 
That it might be a healing dew, 

To steal some fever from your grief. 

After our child's untroubled breath 

Up to the Father took its way, 
And on our home the shade of death 

Like a long twilight haunting lay, 

And friends came round, with us to weep 

Her little spirit's swift remove, 
The story of the Alpine sheep 

Was told to us, by one we love. 

They, in the valley's sheltering care, 
Soon crop the meadow's tender prime; 

And, when the sod grows brown and bare, 
The shepherd strives to make them climb 

To airy shelves of pasture green, 
That hang along the mountain side, 

Where grass and flowers together lean, 

And down through mist the sunbeams slide. 






THE WIDOW AGAIN BEREAVED. 157 

But naught can tempt the timid things 

The steep and rugged paths to try, 
Though sweet the shepherd calls and sings, 

And seared below the pastures lie, 

Till in his arms their lambs he takes, 

Along the dizzy verge to go ; 
Then, heedless of the rifts and breaks, 

They follow on, o'er rock and snow. 

And in those pastures lifted fair, 
More dewy soft than lowland mead, 

The shepherd drops his tender care, 
And sheep and lambs together feed. 

This parable, by nature breathed, 

Blew on me as the south wind free 
O'er frozen brooks, that flow unsheathed 

From icy thraldom to the sea. 

A blissful vision, through the night, 

Would all my happy senses sway, 
Of the Good Shepherd, on the height, 

Or climbing up the starry way, 

Holding our little lamb asleep, — 

While, like the murmur of the sea, 
Sounded that voice along the deep, 

Saying, Arise, and follow me." 

Mrs. Lowell. 



158 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

The tendency of selfish sorrow is to isola- 
tion ; but grief borne with submission, and 
acceptance of God's chastening purpose, opens 
the heart to the fellowship of Christ's suffer- 
ings, and we are willing to suffer, — yes, we 
can even rejoice in tribulation, if through it 
we may learn to comfort others. " The God of 
all comfort . . . comforteth us in all our tribula- 
tion," not for our own peace merely, but " that 
we may be able to comfort them which are 
in any trouble by the comfort wherewith we 
ourselves are comforted of God." 1 

" Oh, be content to die, to be laid low, 
And to be bruised, and to be broken so, 
If thou upon God's altar mavest be bread, 
Life-giving food for souls a-hungered." 

Very touching is the thought that Jesus 
did this miracle for the widow of Nain, not 
because of her faith, or her love, or in answer 
to prayer, or for any merit in herself, but 
simply because she was in sore distress. " He 
had compassion on her." Perhaps the thought 

1 2 Cor. i. 4. 2 Trench, sonnet on " Tribulation." 






THE WIDOW AGAIN BEREAVED. 1 59 

of his own mother, probably already a widow, 
whose heart was shortly to be pierced by a 
more bitter grief, added to His tenderness for 
this stricken widow. 

Let us come to Him, then, in our grief, not 
waiting for merit, for faith or love : our very 
sorrow is a claim upon His divine compassion. 

One of the greatest attractions to the wor- 
ship of Mary lies in her character of the 
sorrowing mother, through whose own soul 
the sword has pierced, full of sympathy for 
all sorrowful hearts longing for mother- 
love. 

Oh, come rather to your compassionate 
Saviour ! He was " a man of sorrows, and 
acquainted with grief." " As one whom his 
mother comforteth, so will I comfort you." 
No merely human sympathy, were it even 
that of the mother of Jesus, — most blessed 
and most sorrowful of women, — can heal your 
broken heart. 

We sometimes say of Jesus, How human 
was 1 1 is compassion ! Should we not rather 



160 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

say, How divine! What human heart can so 
enter into the deepest sorrow of another ? 
What man shall dare to say, Weep not ! 
Can we restore the dead to life ? 

" I am the resurrection, and the life : he 
that believeth in me, though he were dead, 
yet shall he live ; and whosoever liveth, and 
believeth in me, shall never die." 

Jesus " touched the bier." As He touched 
the blind eyes, and put His finger in the deaf 
ears ; as He touched the leper and cleansed 
him, and took the ruler's daughter by the 
hand, saying, Maid, arise ! — as He " took our 
infirmities, and bare our sicknesses," so by 
His touch death has been changed from an 
enemy into a friend. " Women received their 
dead raised to life again." We dare not ask 
that our dead may be restored ; yet we have 
God's promise that they shall be. They are 
with the risen Saviour, and they, too, shall rise. 
" Christ the first-fruits ; afterward they that 
are Christ's at His coming." " Thanks be to 
God, which giveth us the victory, through our 
Lord Jesus Christ." 



THE WIDOW AGAIN BEREAVED. l6l 



" And He came, and touched the bier." 

WHO says, The widow's heart must break, 
The childless mother sink ? 
A kinder, truer voice I hear, 
Which even beside that mournful bier, 

Whence parents' eyes would hopeless shrink, 

Bids weep no more. — O heart bereft, 
How strange, to thee, that sound ! 

A widow o'er her only son, 

Feeling more bitterly alone, 

For friends that press officious round. 

Yet is the voice of comfort heard, 
For Christ hath touched the bier, — 

The bearers wait with wondering eye, 

The swelling bosom dares not sigh, 
But all is still, 'twixt hope and fear. 

Even such an awful, soothing calm 

We sometimes see alight 
( )Yr ( Ihristian mourners, while they wait 
In silence, by some church-yard gate, 

Their summons to the holy rite. 



1 62 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



And such the tones of love, which break 

The stillness of that hour, 
Quelling th' embittered spirit's strife, — 
" The Resurrection and the Life 

Am I ; believe, and die no more." 

Unchanged that voice, —and though not yet 

The dead sit up and speak, 
Answering its call ; we gladlier rest 
Our darlings on earth's quiet breast, 

And our hearts feel they must not break. 

Far better they should sleep awhile 

Within the church's shade, 
Nor wake, until new heaven, new earth, 
Meet for their new, immortal birth, 

For their abiding-place be made, 

Than wander back to life, and lean 

On our frail love once more. 
'T is sweet, as year by year we lose 
Friends out of sight, in faith to muse 

How grows in Paradise our store." 

Keble. 



VIII. 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 



" I am oppressed ; undertake for me." — Isaiah 
xxxviii. 14. 

" O Lord, Thou hast seen my wrong : judge Thou my 
cause." — Lamentations iii. 59. 

" A Father of the fatherless and a Judge of the widows 
is God in His holy habitation." — Psalm lxviii. 5. 

" The Lord also will be a refuge for the oppressed, a 
refuge in times of trouble. And they that know Thy name 
will put their trust in Thee ; for Thou, Lord, hast not for- 
saken them that seek Thee." — Psalm ix. 9, 10. 

" For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the 
needy, now will I arise, saith the Lord." — Psalm xii. 5. 






-fc^l$^ 



u TV /TY spirit on Thy care, 
-L»A Blest Saviour, I recline: 
Thou wilt not leave me to despair, 
For Thou art Love Divine. 

In Thee I place my trust, 

On Thee I calmly rest : 
I know Thee good, I know Thee just, 

And count Thy choice the best. 

Whate'er events betide, 

Thy will they all perform ; 
Safe in Thy breast my head I hide, 

Nor fear the coming storm. 

Let good or ill befall, 

It must be good to me ; 
Secure of having Thee in all, 

Of having all in Thee." 

H. F. Lyte. 




VIII. 

W 7"E have seen how the tender mercy of 
God was shown in the laws given to 
His chosen people, for the benefit of " the 
stranger, the fatherless and the widow." These 
three classes are nearly always mentioned in 
connection ; for by their very position of help- 
lessness and deprivation they were more liable 
to suffer from poverty, and more exposed to 
neglect and oppression. They were not only 
to be remembered in the harvests and the 
vintage, and to have their share in the feasts 
of rejoicing, but those who perverted the 
judgment 1 of these helpless ones were to be 
accursed of God, and fearful woes were de- 
nounced upon oppressors. '- Ye shall not 
afflict any widow or fatherless child. If thou 

1 Deut. xxvii. 19. 



1 68 THE WIDOW'S TRUST 

afflict them in any wise, and they cry at all 
unto me, I will surely hear their cry ; and my 
wrath shall wax hot, and I will kill you with 
the sword ; and your wives shall be widows, 
and your children fatherless." 1 

Speaking of the unrighteous, Job says : 
" They drive away the ass of the fatherless, 
they take the widow's ox for a pledge. They 
turn the needy out of the way. They cause the 
naked to lodge without clothing." (Taking 
the widow's raiment in pledge was especially 
forbidden.) " He evil-entreateth the barren 
that beareth not, and doeth not good to the 
widow." Speaking of the " portion of a wicked 
man," he says, " his widows shall not weep." 
Eliphaz, looking upon the trials of Job as 
punishment for sin, accuses him, among other 
things, of having " sent widows away empty." 
Job defends himself, saying : " The blessing 
of him that was ready to perish came upon 
me ; and I caused the widow's heart to sing 
for joy." 2 "Did not I weep for him that was 

1 Exodus xxii. 22-24. 2 J°t> xxix. 13. 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 1 69 

in trouble ? was not my soul grieved for the 
poor ?" ] " If I have withheld the poor from 
their desire, or have caused the eyes of the 
widow to fail, or have eaten my morsel my- 
self alone, and the fatherless hath not eaten 
thereof ; (for from my youth he was brought 
up with me, . . . and I have guided her from 
my mother's womb)." 2 

The book of Job is supposed to have 
been written during (or after) the reign 
of Solomon. There was no period of more 
general prosperity in the history of the Jew- 
ish nation. In his wisdom and the justice of 
his judgments, and the general peace which 
prevailed during his reign, Solomon is regarded 
as a type of Christ ; and some of the Messi- 
anic Psalms had their first fulfilment in him. 
" lie shall judge Thy people with righteousness, 
and Thy poor with judgment. He shall judge 
the poor of the people, he shall save the chil- 
dren of the needy, and shall break in pieces 
the oppressor." 3 

1 Job xxx. 25. 2 jofo xxx ;_ l c ) , iS. 3 Psalm lxxii. 2, 4. 



170 THE WIDOWS TRUST. 

In the book of Ecclesiastes, we have the 
result of Solomon'.s mature experience, — the 
final conclusions of his ripest thought. " So I 
returned, and considered all the oppressions 
that are done under the sun ; and beheld the 
tears of such as were oppressed, and they had 
no comforter ; and on the side of their oppres- 
sors there was power ; but they had no com- 
forter." 1 " If thou seest the oppression of 
the poor, and violent perverting of . . . justice 
in a province, marvel not at the matter: for He 
that is higher than the highest regardeth ; 
and there be higher than they." 

In this general view of " the oppressions . . . 
done under the sun," Solomon may have had 
in mind the heathen nations with whom he 
was on terms of friendliness, and the Eastern 
provinces, governed then as now by nearly 
irresponsible tyrants, whose modes of govern- 
ment were seldom inquired into, when they 
returned satisfactory revenues. But in his 
own kingdom, reduced as it was under a 

1 Ecc. iv. i ; v. 8. 






THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. \Jl 

system of forced labor and taxation, there may 
have been great oppression and perverting of 
justice at the hands of subordinates. The 
people are not said to have complained with 
injustice to Rehoboam, " Thy father made our 
yoke grievous.*' 

And, if such were the state of things under 
a wise and just king, what must it have been 
when an Ahab ruled in Israel, who set the 
example of oppression, or an Ahaz in Judah ? 
The prophets do not leave us in the dark. 
" Woe unto them that decree unrighteous 
decrees, ... to turn aside the needy from judg- 
ment, and to take away the right from the 
poor of my people, that widows may be their 
prey, and that they may rob the fatherless ! " 
" Cease to do evil ; learn to do well ; seek 
judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the 
fatherless, plead for the widow." 1 

Speaking of the sins committed in Jerusalem, 
for which God was about to burn His peo- 
ple like dross in a furnace, Ezekiel says : 
1 [saiah x. i, 2 ; i. 17. 



172 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

"In thee have they set light by father and 
mother ; in the midst of thee have they dealt 
by oppression with the stranger ; in thee have 
they vexed the fatherless and the widow." l 

" The word of the Lord came to Zechariah, 
saying, Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, 
saying, Execute true judgment, and shew 
mercy and compassions every man to his 
brother ; and oppress not the widow, nor the 
fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor ; and let 
none of you imagine evil against his brother 
in your heart. 

" But they refused to hearken, and pulled 
away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that 
they should not hear. Yea, they made their 
hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should 
hear the law, and the words which the Lord 
of hosts hath sent in His Spirit by the 
former prophets : therefore came a great 
wrath from the Lord of hosts. Therefore 
it is come to pass, that as He cried, and they 
would not hear, so they cried, and I would 

1 Ezekiel xxii. 7. 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 1 73 

not hear, saith the Lord of hosts ; but I scat- 
tered them with a whirlwind among all the 
nations whom they knew not." 2 

When the coming of Christ is predicted in 
the last of the prophets, it is added: " But who 
may abide the day of His coming? and who 
shall stand when He appeareth ? for He is like 
a refiner's fire." "And I will come near to 
you to judgment ; and I will be a swift witness 
. . . against those that oppress the hireling in 
his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and 
that turn aside the stranger from his right, 
and fear not me, saith the Lord of hosts." 2 

He was to " proclaim the acceptable year 
of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our 
God; to comfort all that mourn." 3 " For 
the needy shall not always be forgotten : the 
expectation of the poor shall not perish for 
ever." 4 " With righteousness shall He judge 
the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek 
of the earth ; and He shall smite the earth 

1 Zee. vii. 8-14 2 Mai. iii. 2, 5. 

3 Isaiah Ixi. 2. 4 I\s. ix. 18. 



174 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath 
of His lips shall He slay the wicked." 1 

In His mission on earth, Christ claims 
the power of a judge, given Him of His 
Father; though He said also of Himself, " I 
came not to judge the world, but to save the 
world. He that rejecteth me, and receiveth 
not my words, hath one that judgeth him : 
the word that I have spoken, the same shall 
judge him in the last day." 2 

The office of a judge is twofold : to give 
decisions, and pronounce condemnation. The 
Greek words, translated "judge" and "judg- 
ment," have this double sense. 

The lessons of the captivity had been for- 
gotten. Under the government of a Herod, 
we can imagine what injustice and oppression 
could prevail, unchecked. The religious 
leaders of the Jews were divided into Sad- 
ducees, who, believing in no future existence, 
had little restraint from wrong-doing ; and 
Pharisees, of whose merely outward morality 

1 Isaiah xi. 4. 2 John xii. 47, 48. 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 1 75 

and utter inward corruption, the scathing 
denunciations of Christ give terrible demon- 
stration. One of his charges against them 
was that they devoured widows' houses. In 
His parables of the unmerciful servant, the 
unrighteous steward, and the unjust judge, 
He doubtless referred to a condition of things 
well known to His hearers. If the widow of 
this parable were not an actual existence, 
there must have been many such widows in 
Palestine, as in all other countries, since the 
world began. 

" And He spake a parable unto them to 
this end, that men ought always to pray, and 
not to faint ; 

" Saying, There was in a city a judge, which 
feared not God, neither regarded man. 

" And there was a widow in that city ; and 
she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of 
mine adversary. 

" And he would not for a while : but after- 
ward he said within himself, Though I fear 
not God nor regard man, yet, because this 



176 THE WIDOWS TRUST. 

widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by 
her continual coming she weary me. 

" And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust 
judge saith. 

" And shall not God avenge His own elect, 
which cry day and night unto Him, though 
He bear long with them ? I tell you that He 
will avenge them speedily." * 

The same lesson is taught in the parable 
of the friend at midnight : 2 " Though he will 
not rise and give him, because he is his friend, 
yet because of his importunity he will rise 
and give him as many as he needeth." We 
get the favors we earnestly seek from earthly 
friends, though their love be not sufficient 
to grant them speedily; and if this be so, and 
" if we, being evil, give good gifts unto our 
children," how miicJi more will our Heavenly 
Father, out of His great love and compassion, 
supply our need, avenge us of our adversaries, 
and give us, all gifts in one, the gift of His 
Holy Spirit! 

1 Luke xviii. 1-8. 2 Luke xi. 8. 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 1 77 

The unjust judge avenged the widow, lest 
he should be wearied by her continual appeals. 
The friend in the parable shrank from the 
slight trouble of rising at midnight to supply 
another's need. 

But the widow's Judge, "the Lord, the 
Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, 
neither is weary. . . . He giveth power to the 
faint ; and to them that have no might He 
increaseth strength." And we may come at 
the darkest hour, at the very midnight of 
our despair, to our compassionate Friend and 
Saviour, without fear of repulse. " Ask, and it 
shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; 
knock, and it shall be opened unto you." He 
knows our grief ; for " He was oppressed, and 
He was afflicted." He knows what it is to be 
" wounded in the house of " His " friends." 
Among His chosen disciples was one who was 
in the habit of defrauding Him. (Do not all 
who begin by defrauding Christ end by be- 
traying Him ?) 

There has never been a period in the history 



178 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

of the world when the poor and the needy 
have been free from oppression, when the 
widow and the fatherless have not been de- 
frauded of their just dues. "Therefore His 
people return hither ; and waters of a full cup 
are wrung out to them." They ask, " Where- 
fore doth the way of the wicked prosper ? " 
"Doth God know? and is there knowledge in 
the Most High ?" Perhaps, in their distress, 
doubt goes deeper ; and they say, Is there " a 
God that judgeth in the earth? " They cry, 
with the Psalmist, " O Lord God, to whom ven- 
geance belongeth, . . . shew Thyself. Lift up 
Thyself, Thou Judge of the earth : render a re- 
ward to the proud. Lord, how long shall the 
wicked . . . triumph ? . . . They break in pieces 
Thy people, O Lord, and afflict Thine heritage. 
They slay the widow and the stranger, and 
murder the fatherless. Yet they say, The Lord 
shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob 
regard it." But, with the Psalmist, our souls 
return unto their rest. 

" He that planted the ear, shall He not hear ? 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 1 79 

He that formed the eye, shall He not see ? 
. . . Blessed is the man whom Thou chastenest, 
O Lord, and teachest him out of Thy law ; that 
Thou mayest give him rest from the days of 
adversity, until the pit be digged for the wicked. 
For the Lord will not cast off His people, 
neither will He forsake His inheritance. But 
judgment shall return unto righteousness ; and 
all the upright in heart shall follow it. Who 
will rise up for me against the evil-doers ? or 
who will stand up for me against the workers 
of iniquity ? Unless the Lord had been my 
help, my soul had almost dwelt in silence. 
When I said, My foot slippeth, Thy mercy, 
O Lord, held me up. In the multitude of my 
thoughts within me, Thy comforts delight my 
soul. Shall the throne of iniquity have fellow- 
ship with Thee, which frameth mischief by a 
law ? They gather themselves together against 
the soul of the righteous, and condemn the 
innocent blood. 

" But the Lord is my defence ; and my God 
is the rock of my refuge. And He shall bring 



180 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

upon them their own iniquity, and shall cut 
them off in their own wickedness ; yea, the 
Lord our God shall cut them off." 

This was Abraham's sheet-anchor : " Shall 
not the Judge of all the earth do right ? " 
And how many despairing souls have held by 
it since, through the storms of injustice, op- 
pression, and doubt ! 

" God's justice is a bed where we 
Our anxious hearts may lay, 
And, weary with ourselves, may sleep 
Our discontent away." 

Perhaps there never has been a time when 
injustice and oppression seemed more rife 
than the present ; when we can scarcely take 
up a newspaper without reading of some be- 
trayal of trust, the stoppage of some bank 
where the savings of widows and orphans 
were invested, the failure of some Insurance 
Company to which they had trusted for sup- 
port, when the husband and father was taken 
from them. In their desolation, these helpless 
ones see the " clouds return after the rain," 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 181 

and are crushed under stinging disappoint- 
ments and bitter reverses. One resource 
after another fails them : one prop after 
another is removed. Poverty is hard enough 
to bear, when we can take it straight from 
the hand of God ; but when we have the sore 
feeling of injustice to struggle with, the sense 
that we are defrauded, that we have not our 
rights, how much harder is it to be resigned, 
to accept this too as our Father's will ! 
Hardest of all is it, when our wrongs come 
from those upon whose integrity and affection 
we relied, whom motives of gratitude should 
have moved to consideration for our helpless- 
ness. 

From their ignorance of law and business 
transactions, widows become an easy prey to 
the extortioner and the fraudulent and perhaps 
more frequently than any other class fall vic- 
tims. Single women, from stern necessity, 
learn to take care of themselves and their busi- 
ness affairs ; but many widows are thrown upon 
the world like grown-up children, as ignorant, 



1 82 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

and almost as helpless, as their babes. Happy- 
are those who can in submission receive 
these trials as the will of God, and in confi- 
dence appeal to Him as their Judge. 

If men yield to importunity, how much 
more shall God, in His fatherly love and pity, 
grant our requests ! Plead His promises ! 
Pray, and faint not ! Be sure He hears. Our 
prayers are not always answered as we expect. 
God often delays in order to teach us precious 
lessons, which only these troubles could fit us 
to receive. He refuses what we ask, because 
He has some better thing in store, and means 
to bless us through these very afflictions, — 
our poverty, our losses, our sufferings at the 
hand of man. 

As a tender mother refuses a child some 
hurtful toy, or is obliged to delay some 
wished-for pleasure, but meanwhile hushes 
the sobbing babe to rest on her bosom, so 
our Heavenly Father, if for wise reasons He 
cannot give what we want, " quiets us in Him- 
self, without it." 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 1 83 

" 111 that He blesses is our good, 
And unblest good is iil ; 
And all is right that seems most wrong, 
If it be His sweet will." 

I know a widow who has been robbed of 
her all, and has no sure means of support. 
She does the little she can, and trusts con- 
fidently in God ; and He supplies her needs, 
in strange, unlooked-for ways, sometimes by 
His own people, and sometimes by men who 
give no evidence of piety. She asks, " Do 
you think God will feed His birds, and starve 
His own babes ? " She says, with confident 
joy, " Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob 
for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his 
God, which executeth judgment for the op- 
pressed, which giveth food to the hungry." I 
have heard her quote whole pages of Scrip- 
ture, — "God's own words to widows," she 
calls them : — 

" Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He 
shall sustain thee." 

" Trust in the Lord, and do good ; so shalt 



184 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt 
be fed." 

" They that seek the Lord shall not want 
any good thing." 

"Behold the fowls of the air: . . . your 
Heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not 
much better than they ? " 

" If God so clothe the grass of the field, 
shall He not much more clothe you ? " 

" Your Heavenly Father knoweth that ye 
have need of all these things." 

" My God shall supply all your need." 
" Even to your old age I am He ; and even 
to hoar hairs will I carry you." 

Then there is the whole of the thirty-fourth 
Psalm, and the fifty-fourth chapter of Isaiah, 
and many more. Indeed, the Bible is full of 
consoling promises. 

This widow had drawn " honey out of the 
Rock." Another said to me, " I have been 
placed in peculiarly trying circumstances 
ever since my husband died ; but ' Prayer and 
Silence' has been my watchword. Prayer 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 1 85 

and silence have carried me through every- 
thing." 

It may be asked, Should a widow not 
employ legal remedies against fraud and op- 
pression ? That question must be settled 
according to circumstances ; but when we 
think of the slow, unsatisfactory nature of 
legal remedies, — the technicalities of the 
law often seeming made rather for the benefit 
of the guilty than of the innocent, — we feel 
like echoing St. Paul's advice to the Corin- 
thians, when he urged them to settle their 
quarrels and grievances by an appeal to judges 
among themselves, rather than to drag them 
before heathen courts of justice. " Why do 
ye not rather take wrong ? why do ye not 
rather suffer yourselves to be defrauded ? " 1 

But we have been thinking of cases beyond 
the help of the law, where a widow can ap- 
peal only to her Divine Judge for redress. 

" Dearly beloved," says the apostle again, 
" avenge not yourselves, but rather give 

1 1 Cor. vi. 7. 



1 86 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

place unto wrath ; for it is written, Vengeance 
is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord." 1 And 
he urges the suffering saints in Rome to be 
"patient in tribulation ; continuing instant in 
prayer." 2 'Tis the lesson of our parable, which 
he enforces again in the Epistle to the Ephe- 
sians : — 

" Praying always with all prayer and sup- 
plication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto, 
with all perseverance and supplication for all 
saints." 

Do you remember Christian's effectual 
weapon, in his fight with Apollyon, "All 
prayer," which he used in connection with 
the " Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word 
of God"? In the Valley of Humiliation — 
when all these troubles befall us which tempt 
us to doubt God's love and care — as in the 
darker Valley of the Shadow, our only safety 
is in clinging to our Guide. He has been over 
every step of the way before us ; He is with 

1 Romans xii. 19. - Ibid. 12. 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 1 87 

us, to uphold and comfort and protect us : 
let us fear no evil ! 

" Be careful for nothing ; but in every thing 
by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, 
let your requests be made known unto God. 

"And the peace of God, which passeth all 
understanding, shall keep your hearts and 
minds through Christ Jesus." 



1 88 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



"He is our peace." 

LIFE'S mystery — deep, restless as the 
ocean — 
Hath surged and wailed for ages to and fro \ 
Earth's generations watch its ceaseless motion, 
As in and out its hollow moanings flow. 
Shivering and yearning by that unknown sea, 
Let my soul calm itself, O God ! in Thee. 

Life's sorrows, with inexorable power, 
Sweep desolation o'er this mortal plain ; 
And human loves and hopes fly as the chaff 
Borne by the whirlwind from the ripened grain, 
Oh ! when before that blast my hopes all flee, 
Let my soul calm itself, O Christ ! in Thee. 

Between the mysteries of death and life 
Thou standest, loving, guiding, not explaining ; 
We ask, and Thou art silent ; yet we gaze, 
And our charmed hearts forget their drear com- 
plaining. 
No crushing fate, no stony destiny, 
Thou 'Lamb that hath been slain!' we rest 
in Thee. 



THE OPPRESSED WIDOW. 1 89 

The many waves of thought, the mighty tides, 
The ground-swell that rolls up from other lands, 
From far-off worlds, from dim, eternal shores, 
Whose echo dashes o'er life's wave-worn strands ; 
This vague, dark tumult of the inner sea 
Grows calm, grows bright, O risen Lord ! in 
Thee. 

Thy pierced hand guides the mysterious wheels, 
Thy thorn-crowned brow now wears the crown 

of power ; 
And when the dark enigma presses sore, 
Thy patient voice says, ' Watch with me one 

hour.' 
As sinks the moaning river in the sea, 
In silent peace, so sinks my soul in Thee." 

Mrs. Stowe. 



\d& 



IX. 



THE CHARITABLE WIDOW. 



" A little that a righteous man hath is better than the 
riches of many wicked." — Psalm xxxvii. 16. 

"There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth ; and there 
is that withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to 
poverty. 

" The liberal soul shall be made fat ; and he that water- 
eth shall be watered also himself." — Proverbs xi. 24, 25. 

*' Remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how He said, 
It is more blessed to give than to receive." — Acts xx. 35. 

"Freely ye have received, freely give." — Matthew 



^ 



THE WIDOW'S MITE. 

'" I ^IS given from a scanty store, 

-*- And missed while it is given ; 

'Tis given, — for the claims of earth 

Are less than those of heaven. 

Few, save the poor, feel for the poor : 
The rich know not how hard 

It is to be of needful food 
And needful rest debarred. 

Their paths are paths of plenteousness, 
They sleep on silk and down, 

And never think how heavily 
The weary head lies down. 



They know not of the scanty meal, 
With small, pale faces round ; 

No fire upon the cold, damp hearth, 
When snow is on the ground. 
J 3 



194 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

They never by their window sit, 

And see the gay pass by, 
Yet take their weary work again, 

Though with a mournful eye. 

The rich, they give, — they miss it not : 

A blessing cannot be 
Like that which rests, thou widowed one, 

Upon thy gift and thee." 

L. E. Landon. 





IX. 



i^VURING the very last week of Christ's 
ministry on earth, and probably on the 
last clay of His teaching in the temple, the 
incident occurred which furnishes the subject 
of this chapter. " In the daytime He was 
teaching in the temple ; and at night He went 
out, and abode in the mount that is called the 
mount of Olives. And all the people came early 
in the morning to Him in the temple, for to 
hear Him." 1 On this Tuesday, He had been 
harassed by the attempts of the Pharisees and 
the Sadducees to catch Him in His words, and 
had afterwards addressed to the multitude and 
to His disciples those words of fearful warn- 
ing and denunciation : " Woe unto you, scribes 

1 Luke xxi. 37, 38. 



196 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

and Pharisees, hypocrites ! " recorded in the 
twenty-third chapter of Matthew, predicting 
the terrible vengeance of God upon that gen- 
eration, and ending with that outburst of 
divine compassion : " O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, 
thou that killest the prophets, and stonest 
them which are sent unto thee, how often 
would I have gathered thy children together, 
even as a hen gathereth her chickens under 
her wings, and ye would not ! Behold, your 
house is left unto you desolate. For I say 
unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth, till 
ye shall say, Blessed is He that cometh in 
the name of the Lord." 

This was the last discourse of Christ in the 
temple. The incident of the Widow's Mite is 
not related in Matthew ; but in both Mark 
and Luke it is told in immediate connection 
with this address to the Pharisees. 

He said to the people, " Beware of the 
scribes, which love to go in long clothing, 
and love salutations in the market-places, 
and the chief seats in the synagogues, and 



THE CHARITABLE WIDOW. 1 97 

the uppermost rooms at feasts : which de- 
vour widows' houses, and for a pretence make 
long prayers : these shall receive greater dam- 
nation. 

" And Jesus sat over against the treasury, 
and beheld how the people cast money into 
the treasury ; and many that were rich cast 
in much." 

The " treasury " was in the court of the 
women, between the inner court of the Jews 
and the outer court of the Gentiles, a place 
where Jesus was accustomed to teach ; acces- 
sible to all, yet quieter and less public than 
the outer court, which He had just for the 
second time purified from its desecration by 
the money-changers and the sellers of mer- 
chandise. Here stood thirteen chests, or 
brazen vessels, broadening from the top 
downwards, (the word used denotes the form 
of a trumpet), into which the people cast their 
free-will offerings for the support of the tem- 
ple worship. This offering must not be con- 
founded with the "atonement offering" 1 of 
1 Exodus xxx. 12-16. 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



half a shekel, which every man, from twenty 
years old and upwards, was to pay yearly, — 
the rich no more, and the poor no less, — but 
owed its origin, perhaps, to the collection for 
the repairing of the temple in the time of 
Joash, when "at the king's commandment 
they made a chest, and set it without at the 
gate of the house of the Lord, . . . and all the 
princes and all the people rejoiced, and cast 
into the chest, until they had made an end." 1 
The chest was emptied by the priests, and re- 
filled by the people, until more than enough had 
been collected for the needful repairs ; and the 
silver and gold remaining were melted down, 
and made into vessels for the sanctuary. 

As Jesus "looked up" from His seat near 
these chests, He saw the rich men casting 
"money" into them (the word used in Mark 
means a brass or copper coin, about the value 
of two English pence), "and many that were 
rich cast in much." " And there came a cer- 
tain poor widow, and she threw in two mites, 

1 2 Chronicles xxiv. 4-14. 






THE CHARITABLE WIDOW. 199 

which make a farthing." The coin mentioned 
was the smallest in use among the Jews. 

"And He called unto Him His disciples, 
and saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, 
That this poor widow hath cast more in than 
all they which have cast into the treasury ; 
for all they did cast in of their abundance : 
but she of her want did cast in all that she 
had, even all her living." : The same word 
translated " want " in Mark is " penury " in 
Luke. It implies poverty, deficiency, narrow- 
ness of means, rather than absolute destitu- 
tion. This widow was by no means a beggar 
or an object of charity, but one who, support- 
ing herself by hard labor, could yet spare a 
portion, trifling in itself, but large to her, for 
a free-will offering to the Lord. In proportion 
to her means, she had given more than any one 
else ; for they gave out of abundance, she out 
of her poverty, " all the living that she had." 
God had given her strength to work, and earn 
her bread, day by day ; and she made this 

1 Mark xii. 41-44. 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST 



grateful acknowledgment of her love to Him. 
She certainly had no great anxiety for the 
future, or she would have saved those two 
mites " for a rainy day," instead of casting 
them into the treasury of the Lord. 

Was she wanting in prudence ? 

She might have reasoned that, in her nar- 
row circumstances, she was not required to 
give, it could not be expected of her. There 
were enough who had abundant means ; the 
provision for the temple worship was always 
ample ; God could take care of His house and 
His ministers; finally, that so small a sum 
as two mites could not matter either way, or 
that it was more important to her in her pov- 
erty. 

In the simplicity of her love and faith, she 
acted on the true principle of beneficence : 
" according as the Lord thy God shall bless 
thee." She would no more dream of with- 
holding the Lord's share of her scanty means, 
than the dues of those from whom she ob- 
tained her daily food. She had no right to 
lay it up for the future. 



THE CHARITABLE WIDOW. 201 

But He who says, " Give," says also, 
" Trust." " Bring ye all the tithes into the 
storehouse, . . . and prove me now herewith, 
saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you 
the windows of heaven, and pour you out a 
blessing, that there shall not be room enough 
to receive it." : 

" What are you going to do when you are 
old ? " I once asked of a clergyman, who had 
no way of laying up any thing for sickness or 
age. " I am going to accept just what God 
gives to me," he answered. 

Beautiful spirit of trust ! If we could 
all attain to it, we should not be worried 
either with present poverty or fears of future 
want. 

This poor widow had doubtless come into 
the same complete acquiescence in all the 
appointments of God's providence for her : 
more than this, she was grateful that she had 
been able to earn this trifling sum with which 
to express her devotion to God. According 

1 Malachi iii. 10. 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



to the heavenly arithmetic and the balances 
of the sanctuary, the grains of love attached 
to two such mites are more valuable than 
rubies or pearls. God needs nothing from us. 
The silver and the gold are His already, and 
the cattle upon a thousand hills ; He possesses 
all but our affections, and He condescends to 
sue for these. This poor widow had given 
her heart to the Lord ; and, to manifest and 
prove this, she gave all she had. 

The encomium pronounced was not then 
for her ear. She heard not the words of 
spoken praise ; but we know she found a great 
joy in her self-forgetf ulness, her perfect trust 
and entire consecration ; and, though she left 
the temple empty-handed, she carried thence 
sweet peace in her soul. 

This widow was a sister in spirit to Mary, 
who broke the alabaster box of precious oint- 
ment, and poured it on the head of Christ, and 
of her He would also say, " She hath done 
what she could." Love gives its all, whether 
the two mites, or the precious ointment 



THE CHARITABLE WIDOW. 203 

which " might have been sold for more than 
three hundred pence;" an extravagance no 
greater in proportion than the widow's offer- 
ing. 

Could this widow regret that she had but 
" two mites " for all her living, when, with 
eyes fully opened, she saw her Saviour's ap- 
proving smile beaming upon her, and heard 
His voice saying, " Well done, thou good and 
faithful servant ; thou hast been faithful over 
a few things, I will make thee ruler over many 
things: enter thou into the joy of thy 
Lord " ? Can she regret it, now that she 
knows it was ordained that she, one of the 
lowliest and most unnoticed of women, should, 
by means of her deep poverty, and that hum- 
ble offering, teach the world so many great 
and important lessons ? 

We know not all we may be doing in our 
humble lives. " It doth not yet appear " 
either what we shall be, or what we truly are. 
If wc are "faithful in that which is least," 
through our love to Christ, our lowly work 



204 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

and offerings are accepted of Him who de- 
clared that even " a cup of cold water " given 
in His name should not lose its reward. 

Lovely example of giving to God's cause, 
for His service, and to sustain His worship ! 

May we never think that we are too poor 
to give, that God does not require it of us. 
Let us give as He has given unto us, of our 
abundance or of our deficiency ; for He will 
accept the gift of love, as He did the widow's 
mites, which He caused to instruct and en- 
rich the wide, wide world to the end of 
time. 

The principle of these gifts to the treasury 
goes back to the free-will offering enjoined in 
the book of Deuteronomy (ch. xvi. io, 16, 17). 
Three times in a year, — at the Passover, and 
the feasts of Weeks and of Tabernacles, — they 
were to appear before God, " with a tribute of 
a free-will offering, . . . according as the Lord 
thy God hath blessed thee." " They shall not 
appear before the Lord empty : every man 
shall give as he is able, according to the bless- 



THE CHARITABLE WIDOW. 205 

ing of the Lord thy God which He hath given 
thee." 

When the tabernacle was to be set up in 
the wilderness for the service of God, the 
Lord said unto Moses, " Take ye from among 
you an offering unto the Lord : whosoever is of 
a willing heart, let him bring it. . . . And they 
came, every one whose heart stirred him up, 
and every one whom his spirit made willing, 
and they brought the Lord's offering to the 
work of the tabernacle of the congregation, 
and for all His service, and for the holy gar- 
ments. And they came, both men and 
women, as many as were willing-hearted, and 
brought bracelets, and ear-rings, and rings, 
and tablets, all jewels of gold, . . . blue and 
purple and scarlet and fine linen, and goats' 
hair, and red skins of rams, and badgers' skins," 
precious stones for the breast-plate, spices and 
oil for the light, and for the sweet incense, — 
" the children of Israel brought a willing 
offering unto the Lord." 1 

1 Exodus xxxv. 4-29. 



206 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

In the book of Joshua, we read : " All the 
silver, and gold, and vessels of brass and 
iron are consecrated unto the Lord : they 
shall come into the treasury of the Lord." ] 
Things taken in war were these, — spoils of the 
heathen, as the others were of the Egyptians. 

When King David made preparations for 
the building of the temple, because he had set 
his affection to the house of God, and the 
princes and the people offered willingly, he 
blessed the Lord, who had given them grace 
to offer " with perfect heart." " But who am 
I, and what is my people, that we should be 
able to offer so willingly after this sort ? for 
all things come of Thee, and of Thine own 
have we given Thee." 

These two elements are recognized by Saint 
Paul as the principle of Christian beneficence : 
to give " according as God hath blessed us," 
and " with a willing heart." 

In place of the free-will offering to the 
temple service, the offerings of the early 

1 Joshua vi. 19. 



THE CHARITABLE WIDOW. 20J 

Christians took the form of " ministering to 
the saints." But the same principle was to 
govern these contributions. They were to be 
systematic : " Upon the first day of the week, 
let every one of you lay by him in store, as 
God hath prospered him;" 1 and given will- 
ingly : " For if there be first a willing mind, 
it is accepted according to that a man hath" 
(love), " and not according to that he hath 
not " (riches). " Every man according as he 
purposeth in his heart, so let him give ; not 
grudgingly, nor of necessity : for God loveth 
a cheerful giver." 2 

How touching is his account of " the 
grace of God bestowed on the churches of 
Macedonia ! how that in a great trial of 
affliction, the abundance of their joy, and 
their deep poverty, abounded unto the riches 
of their liberality. For to their power, I bear 
record, yea, and beyond their power, they 
were willing of themselves ; praying us with 
much entreaty that we would receive the gift, 

1 I Corinthians xvi. 2. 2 2 Corinthians viii. 12 ; ix. 7. 



208 THE WIDOWS TRUST. 

and take upon us the fellowship of the minis- 
tering to the saints." The secret of this 
unselfish devotion appears in the next verse : 
They " first gave their own selves to the 
Lord, and unto us by the will of God." 

He urges the Corinthians to " abound in 
this grace also," " to prove the sincerity of 
their love. For ye know the grace of our 
Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, 
yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye 
through His poverty might be rich." 

It was too late for the Corinthians to do as 
Mary did, and lavish their precious things on 
Jesus. (Blessed was Mary, whom love in- 
spired to anoint Him beforeliand for His 
burial ! When the other women came after- 
ward, with their spices, He was not there : 
He was risen.) 

But Christ was present still, in the person 
of His poor, and in showing their love for 
Him by ministering unto these, they were 
( sure of receiving the acknowledgment : " In- 
asmuch as ye have done it unto one of the 



THE CHARITABLE WIDOW. 209 

least of these my brethren, ye have done 
it unto me." 

Surely, we do not feel enough the blessed 
privilege of giving ! We regard it as a duty ; 
and we cannot do more than our duty. When 
we have done all, we are unprofitable ser- 
vants. Christ never meant that saying to 
make duty seem to us a dry, hard thing, or 
God an exacting master. He says expressly, 
" I call you not servants ; . . . but I have called 
you friends." " Whatsoever ye do, do it 
heartily, as to the Lord." Make your gifts 
an offering of grateful love ! Give to God, 
for His service and worship, to spread the 
knowledge of His name among the heathen, 
to promote His cause everywhere ! Give to 
the poor, especially to the poor saints, as if 
you saw Christ present, sick and in prison, or 
needing food and raiment. 

If you have little to give, God can bless 
that little. Great things are often accom- 
plished by very limited resources. Those 
who have little money can often give their 



210 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

time and influence for the Lord. None are 
too poor to give love and sympathy. The 
rich need the blessings and the sympathy 
and the prayers of the poor, as much as 
the poor need the beneficence of the rich. 
As St. Paul told the Corinthians : " Your 
abundance may be a supply for their want, 
their abundance also may be a supply for 
your want : ... as it is written, He that had 
gathered much had nothing over ; and he that 
had gathered little had no lack." " And God 
is able to make all grace abound toward you ; 
that ye, always having all sufficiency in all 
things, may abound to every good work." 



THE CHARITABLE WIDOW. 



" "DRING thine all, thy choicest treasure, 

•*—* Heap it high* and hide it deep : 

Thou shalt win o'erflowing measure, 

Thou shalt climb where skies are steep. 

For as Heaven's true only light 

Quickens all those forms so bright, 

So, when bounty never faints, 

Then the Lord is with His saints, 

Mercy's sweet contagion spreading 

Far and wide, from heart to heart, 

From His wounds atonement shedding 

On the blessed widow's part." 

Keble. 



' f\ LORD ! how happy should we be, 
^^ If we could cast our care on Thee, 

If we from self could rest ; 
And feel at heart that One above, 
In perfect wisdom, perfect love, 
Is working for the best ! 

How far from this our daily life ! 
Ever disturbed by anxious strife, 

By sudden wild alarms ; 
Oh, could we but relinquish all 
Our earthly props, and simply fall 

( )n thy Almighty arms ! 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



Could we but kneel and cast our load, 
Even while we pray, upon our God ; 

Then rise with lightened cheer, 
Sure that the Father who is nigh 
To still the famished raven's cry- 
Will hear, in that we fear. 

We cannot trust Him as we should, 
So chafes fallen Nature's restless mood 

To cast its peace away ; 
Yet birds and flowerets round us preach, 
All, all the present evil teach 

Sufficient for the day. 

Lord, make these faithless hearts of ours 
Such lessons learn from birds and flowers ; 

Make them from self to cease ; 
Leave all things to a Father's will, 
And taste before Him, lying still, 

Even in affliction, peace." 



X. 



MINISTERING WIDOWS. 



" God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labor 
of love, which ye have shewed towards His name, in that 
ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister." — He- 
brews vi. 10. 

" We give thanks to God always for you all ; remem- 
bering without ceasing your work of faith, and labor of love, 
and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ." — I Thes- 
SALONIANS i. 2, 3. 

" For even the Son of man came not to be ministered 
unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for 
many." — Mark x. 45. 

" My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to 
finish His work." — John iv. 34. 



"xfr 



"*? 



WHAT are we set on earth for ? Say, to 
toil, 
Nor seek to leave thy tending of the vines 
For all the heat o' the day, till it declines, 
And death's mild curfew shall from work assoil. 
God did anoint thee with His odorous oil 
To wrestle, not to reign ; and He assigns 
All thy tears over, like pure crystallines 
For younger fellow-workers of the soil 
To wear for amulets. So others shall 
Take patience, labor, to their heart and hand, 
From thy hand, and thy heart, and thy brave 

cheer, 
And God's grace fructify through thee to all. 
The least flower with a brimming cup may stand, 
And share its dew-drop with another near." 

Mrs. Browning. 



X. 



^T"*HE earliest mention of widows in the 
Church is in the sixth chapter of Acts, 
where we are told, " There arose a murmuring 
of the Grecians [or Hellenist Jews] against 
the Hebrews, because their widows were 
neglected in the daily ministration." This 
led to the appointment of deacons, or servants 
of the Church, who should give special attention 
to this work, and leave the apostles free for 
the ministry of the word and prayer. The 
" ministration" had been instituted soon after 
the Pentecostal outpouring, when "all that 
believed were together, and had all things 
common ; and sold their possessions and 
goods, and parted them to all men, as every 
man had need." " Neither was there any 
among them that lacked ; for as many as were 



2l8 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

possessors of lands or houses sold them, and 
brought the prices of the things that were sold, 
and laid them down at the apostles' feet ; and 
distribution was made unto every man accord- 
ing as he had need." 1 

There seem to have been many widows in 
the early Church. In their desolate state, they 
were naturally attracted to Christianity ; and 
probably not a few Christian women were 
made widows, in the persecutions which began 
so soon at Jerusalem, and which followed the 
Church everywhere, during the first centuries 
of its growth. 

When Dorcas lay dead, and they brought 
Peter into the upper chamber, " all the widows 
stood by him weeping, and shewing the coats 
and garments which Dorcas made, while 
she was with them." Whether these were 
widows whom Dorcas had relieved, or whether 
there was already a band of widows, or dea- 
conesses, in Joppa, of which Dorcas was a 
member, does not appear. We are not told 

1 Acts ii. 44, 45, and iv. 34, 35. 



MINISTERING WIDOWS. 219 

whether she was a virgin, a wife, or a widow : 
the name by which she is called signifies 
merely " a female disciple ; " but she was 
certainly a typical deaconess, if not an actual 
one. 

When Paul visited Philippi, he and Silas 
went on the Sabbath day to a place outside 
the city, " by a river side, where prayer was 
wont to be made ; and sat down, and spake 
unto the women which resorted thither." x 
One of these women is mentioned by name : 
Lydia, " whose heart the Lord opened," and 
who, " when she was baptized, and her house- 
hold," constrained Paul and Silas to abide at 
her house ; and they are doubtless alluded to 
in his Epistle to the Philippians, " I entreat 
thee . . . help those women which labored with 
me in the gospel." * 

We hear of the Christian women at Rome, 
in the greetings sent by Saint Paul through 
Phoebe, "a servant of the Church at Cenchrea," 
literally " a deaconess." There was a " Mary, 

1 Acls xvi. 13, 14 ; and Philippians iv. 3. 



220 THE IV WO IV S TRUST. 

who bestowed much labor upon " the apostle ; 
" Tryphena and Tryphosa, who labor in the 
Lord ; " and " the beloved Persis, which labored 
much in the Lord." "Julia" is saluted, and 
the sister of Nereus, and the aged mother of 
Rufus. " Salute Rufus chosen in the Lord, 
and his mother and mine." Very tender 
must have been the apostle's affection for 
this aged saint. As he advised Timothy, he 
was himself accustomed to "entreat the elder 
women as mothers ; the younger as sisters, 
with all purity." He must have had personal 
acquaintance, also, with Timothy's " grand- 
mother Lois, and mother Eunice," whose 
" unfeigned faith " he holds in joyful remem- 
brance. 

Already an order of deaconesses seems to 
have been established in the Church, as must 
have been needful ; for Eastern customs did 
not allow the deacons free access to the female 
portion of the community. It was their office, 
says Clement, " to assist in the distribution of 
alms, provide for the poor and sick, introduce 



MINISTERING WIDOWS. 



the Gospel, and assist the younger women 
with their counsel and encouragement." There 
was another order, of aged widows, of worthy 
character, and destitute of means of support, 
who seem to have formed a permanent charge 
upon the public funds of the Church. " Let 
not a widow be taken into the number under 
threescore years old, having been the wife 
of one man, well reported of for good works ; 
if she have brought up children, if she have 
lodged strangers, if she have washed the saints' 
feet, if she have relieved the afflicted, if she 
have diligently followed every good work." 1 
These qualifications imply a previous service 
as deaconess, either official or voluntary. 

The widows began to be confounded with 
the female ministers, in the fourth century. 
A decree of the Emperor Theodosius, that 
deaconesses must be sixty years old, which 
sprang out of this misunderstanding, was ab- 
rogated by the synod of Chalcedon ; and the 
requisite age fixed at forty years. This order 

1 I Timothy v. 9, 10. 



222 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



was the prototype of all orders of widows or 
virgins, deaconesses and Sisters of Charity, 
Catholic or Protestant, which have since ex- 
isted in the Church. 

While the duty and privilege of Christian 
ministry appeal to all women who love the 
Lord Jesus, they seem especially appropriate 
to widows. If the pillars against which they 
leaned, and to which they clung, have broken 
and crumbled, how closely should they cling 
to Christ, how entirely live in Him and for 
Him ! Should not their baptism of suffering 
consecrate them especially to their Master's 
service ? If they have been long in the fur- 
nace of affliction, should they not come out 
" purified unto Himself, a peculiar people, 
zealous of good works " ? 

If they are laid aside from the employments 
of other women, as the care of a husband and 
household, and have no young children to 
require their constant attention, can they not 
hold themselves in readiness for the most 
delightful of all occupations, God's work ? 



MINISTERING WIDOWS. 223 

Many solitary women and widows devote 
themselves unselfishly to their friends, — 
without considering whether those friends 
really need such service, — and think they 
are spending their lives in benevolent labor ; 
but perhaps there are others to do this work. 
There are few to do Christ's work. While 
no duty to relatives and friends should on 
any account be neglected, on pretence of 
serving the Master, should we not ask our- 
selves whether, in fulfilling these duties, we 
are doing all we can for Him ? Christ appre- 
ciates what you do for Him, far more than do 
earthly friends ; He is more grateful, and His 
rewards are sweeter. His work is better than 
theirs, also ; for it extends and multiplies itself. 
If you serve some stranger for Christ's sake, 
that stranger may be incited to serve another, 
for the same reason. 

Do you say, " How shall I find God's work ? " 
Ask Him sincerely to show it to you. Work- 
ing for the poor is a part of God's work, 
ministering to the sick, reclaiming the wander- 



224 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

ing. Teaching those ignorant of Christ, and 
persuading sinners to believe in Him, is doing 
a work for God, the importance of which no 
man can measure. " They that turn many to 
righteousness " shall shine " as the stars for 
ever and ever." 

Do not say, " I do not know how to do this 
work : I am not qualified." God can teach 
you, and fit you, and furnish you liberally for 
His service. " If any of you lack wisdom, let 
him ask of God ; . . . and it shall be given him." 
Are you weak, and faint-hearted ? " He giveth 
power to the faint ; and to them who have no 
might He increaseth strength." 

Perhaps you will say, " I have roused my- 
self to Christian activity, and have made 
vigorous efforts for those about me ; praying 
earnestly, and, as I thought, depending upon 
God for strength. But I was left to make 
miserable mistakes and failures : all my efforts 
seemed misdirected. I either spoke to the 
wrong person, or said and did the wrong thing. 
I thought that I had done more harm than 



MINISTERING WIDOWS. 225 

good ; and I was nearly crushed with dis- 
couragement, and felt as if God had laid me 
aside, and would not allow me the privilege 
of accomplishing any thing for Him." 

God lets us fail sometimes, to show us 
our dependence upon Him. I shall never 
forget the counsel of an aged minister to a 
young beginner in the Christian life : " My 
daughter, remember God hasn't a child o 1 
earth, who can stand alone." Submission is 
the first lesson, — " Thy will be done," for us, 
and with us, and in us, and tlirough us, — 
the first lesson, and the last. " Teach me to 
do Thy will !" we pray, and perhaps our very 
discouragements and seeming failures are a 
part of God's answer to our prayer. We are 
thus emptied of self-confidence, humbled with 
self-distrust, self-contempt, and the bitterest 
of all pains, self-reproach ; and we lie with 
our faces in the dust. Then we are weak, that 
we may be made strong, through Him whose 
" strength is made perfect in weakness ; " we 
are humbled, that we may be exalted to this 
"5 



226 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

highest privilege of being able to help others 
heavenward. 

" God doth with us as men with torches do, 
Not light them for themselves." 

The torch shines by burning. If we can 
imagine a torch to be sentient, it would seem 
as if all glory in its brightness or usefulness 
must be prevented by the pain of burning. 
So it may be with the Christian : so, and not 
otherwise, may our light shine. We are to 
present our bodies a living sacrifice, to do or 
suffer the will of God : even if they be con- 
sumed upon His altar, jt is but our reasonable 
service. 

It may seem a low motive to Christian use- 
fulness, that there is no better tonic for our 
own weakness, no surer means of spiritual 
growth. We may be certain, however, that 
nothing can lift us from our depths of sorrow, 
and divert us from our lasting, settled grief, 
but high aims and purposes, which shall engage 
all our best energies. It is true, as Robert 
Browning tells us : — 



MINISTER I AG WIDOWS. 227 

" Man's work is to labor, and leaven, 
As best he may, earth here with heaven. 
'Tis work for work's sake that he's needing. 
Let him work on, as if speeding 
Work's end, but not dream of succeeding ; 
Because if success were intended, 
Why, heaven would begin ere earth ended." 

But heaven does begin before earth ends, 
to the soul filled with the love of Christ and 
absorbed in His work. And God promises 
success. " He that soweth to the Spirit shall 
of the Spirit reap life everlasting. And let 
us not be weary in well doing ; for in due sea- 
son we shall reap if we faint not. As we 
have therefore opportunity, let us do good 
unto all, especially unto them who are of the 
household of faith." 1 What a comfort to the 
desolate heart are those words, " the household 
of faith " / We are not alone : we are mem- 
bers of a great family, in heaven and earth ; 
we have a home, fndestructible, though earthly 
dwellings crumble into ruins. And our 
work shall be its own reward. 

1 Galatians vi. 8-10. 



228 THE WIDOWS TRUST. 

" Thy love shall chant itself its own beatitudes, 
After its own life-working. A child's kiss 
Set on thy sighing lips shall make thee glad ; 
A poor man served by thee shall make thee rich ; 
A sick man helped by thee shall make thee strong : 
Thou shalt be served thyself by every sense 
Of service which thou renderest." ' 

Let us give ourselves to the work of the 
Lord with no half-heartedness, but with a 
whole-souled enthusiasm, that shall make any, 
even the lowliest, service for Christ a privilege 
and a delight. We may see no fruit of our 
efforts. The seed sown may not even blossom 
till we are in the dust ; but our service will 
be gratefully accepted by Christ, if fragrant 
with love, as was the precious ointment poured 
upon His feet. His voice may whisper to us 
alone, She " hath not ceased to kiss my feet." 
" She loved much." 

God has taught us in the school of sorrow. 
He has comforted us, that we may know how 
to comfort others. He has freely given to us, 
that we may freely give. 

1 Mrs. Browning. 



MINISTERING WIDOWS. 



He has supplied our wants, and appeared 
for our relief in times of trouble and perplexity, 
— in the very extremity of need, — that our 
faith might be strong, and that others might 
be led to trust Him. Let us use, in His 
service, all the powers He has given, and de- 
veloped, and purified, fitting us as instruments 
in the furnace of affliction. Has He trusted 
us with riches ? Let them be freely poured 
out upon His altar. " Charge them that are 
rich," says Saint Paul, " that they do good, 
that they be rich in good works, ready to dis- 
tribute, willing to communicate," or, as the mar- 
gin has it, "sociable." x Shut not yourselves 
up in your sorrow : make life happy for others ! 
Bring those that are poor and cast out to your 
house ! Give such feasts as Jesus enjoined, 
inviting " the poor, the maimed, the lame, the 
blind." 2 Distribute to the necessities of the 
saints ; be given to hospitality ! 

Are we poor ? If " rich in faith, and heirs 
of the kingdom," how much have we to im- 

1 i Timothy vi. 17, 18. 2 Luke xiv. 13, 14. 



THE WIDOW'S TRUST 



part to others ! We can lead them to Him 
whom we have tried and proved, as our Father 
and Guide, our Portion, our Refuge, our Re- 
deemer, our Comforter in grief, our Judge 
in oppression, our loving Master, to whom our 
adoring hearts offer their all. Blessed were 
those women, healed by Christ, who followed 
Him, and ministered to Him of their sub- 
stance ; but we also may minister to Him, in 
the person of His poor. " Inasmuch as ye 
have done it unto one of the least of these 
my brethren, ye have done it unto me." 1 

Earth knows no higher joy than faithful 
ministry ; and, in that brighter world to which 
we hasten, those who have " come out of great 
tribulation, and have washed their robes, and 
made them white in the blood of the Lamb," 
are " before the throne of God, and serve 
Him day and night in His temple ; and He 
that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among 
them. 

" They shall hunger no more, neither thirst 

1 Matthew xxv. 40. 



MINISTERING WIDOWS. 23 1 

any more ; neither shall the sun light on them, 
nor any heat. 

" For the Lamb, which is in the midst of the 
throne shall feed them, and shall lead them 
unto living fountains of waters : and God 
shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." 



232 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 



1 The Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to 
minister." 

" OINCE service is the highest lot, 
^ And all are in one body bound, 
In all the world the place is not 
Which may not with this bliss be crowned. 

The sufferer on the bed of pain 
Need not be laid aside from this ; 
But for each kindness gives again 
This "joy of doing kindnesses." 

The poorest may enrich this feast: 
Not one lives only to receive, 
But renders through the hands of Christ 
Richer returns than man can give. 

The little child, in trustful glee 

With love and gladness brimming o'er, 

Many a cup of ministry 

May for the weary veteran pour. 

The lonely glory of a throne 
May yet this lowly joy preserve : 
Love may make that a stepping-stone, 
And change " I reign " into " I serve." 



MFNISTERIXG WIDOWS. 233 

This, by the ministries of prayer, 
The loneliest life with blessings crowds, 
Can consecrate each petty care, 
Make angels' ladders out of clouds. 

Nor serve we only when we gird 
Ourselves for special ministry : 
That creature best has ministered 
Which is what it was meant to be. 

Birds by being glad their Maker bless ; 
By simply shining, sun and star ; 
And we, whose law is love, serve less 
By what we do than what we are. 

Since service is the highest lot, 
And angels know no higher bliss, 
Then with what good her cup is fraught, 
Who was created but for this." 

Mrs. Charles. 



XI. 



WIDOWS INDEED. 



"Is any among you afflicted? let him pray." — James 
v. 13. 

"Rejoicing in hope ; patient in tribulation; continuing 
instant in prayer." — Romans xii. 12. 

" Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the 
Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and 
supplication for all saints." — Ephesians vi. 18. 

"Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer 
and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be 
made known unto God. And the peace of God, which 
passethall understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds 
through Christ Jesus."— Philippians iv. 6, 7. 



" Pray without ceasing.' 

UNTIRED is He in mercy's task, 
Then tire not thou to ask. 
He says not : ' Yesterday I gave, 
Wilt thou for ever crave ? ' 
He every moment waits to give : 
Watch thou unwearied to receive. 
Thine hours of prayer, upon the cross 
To Him, were hours of woe and shame and loss ; 
Scourging at morn ; at noon pierced hands and 

feet ; 
At eve fierce pains of death, for thee He counted 

sweet. 



The blue sky o'er the green earth bends, 

At night the dew descends ; 

The green earth to the blue heaven's ray 

Its bosom spreads all day"; 

Earth answers heaven, — the holy race 

Should answer His unfailing grace. 



238 THE WIDOW'S TRUST 

Then smile, low world, in spite or scorn, 
We to our God will kneel in prime of morn ; 
The third, the sixth, the ninth, each Passion 

hour, 
We with high praise will keep, as He with gifts 

of power." 

Keble. 



PRAY for my soul. More things are wrought 
by prayer 
Than this world dreams of. Wherefore let thy 

voice 
Rise like a fountain for me, night and day. 
For what are men better than sheep or goats 
That nourish a blind life within the brain, 
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer, 
Both for themselves and those who call them 

friend ? 
For so the whole round earth is every way 
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God." 

Tennyson. 



SIRif 



XL 

" TTONOR widows," says St. Paul, u that 
are widows indeed." He goes on to 
describe such an one. " Now she that is a 
widow indeed, and desolate, trusteth in God, 
and continueth in supplications and prayers 
night and day." 

This order of aged and desolate widows, 
though at first distinct from the deaconesses, 
included those whose lives had been spent in 
faithful ministry. " Well reported of for good 
works ; if she have brought up children, if she 
have lodged strangers, if she have washed the 
saints' feet, if she have relieved the afflicted, 
if she have diligently followed every good 
work." * 

Those who had children and nephews were 
to be supported by them, that they might 

1 i Timothy v. 10. 



240 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

learn to " show piety at home, and to requite 
their parents ; " and if any man or woman that 
believed had widows depending upon them, 
" let them relieve them, and let not the church 
be charged ; that it may relieve them that are 
widows indeed." 

They were not to be admitted into the 
order under threescore years of age : " The 
younger widows refuse," " I will that the 
younger women marry," said the apostle, in 
his wisdom. (The Epistles to Timothy were 
written some seven years later than the first 
Epistle to the Corinthians.) 

Without Natural supporters, too aged and 
feeble for the ordinary employments of women, 
and laid aside in great measure from their 
benevolent work, these " widows indeed " 
were, like Anna in the temple, set apart to 
the service of God in prayer. 

Such widows were to be honored in the 
Church. There was little honor or consider- 
ation for widows, or for woman, in any heathen 
nation. Her position was higher among the 



WIDOWS INDEED. 24 1 

Jews than among the Greeks and Romans, 
and far better than in any Eastern nation ; 
but even with the Jews great liberty of divorce 
was allowed, and a low standard of morality 
prevailed. " The true import of marriage," 
says Neander, " was realized by Christianity ; 
the equal worth and dignity of the female 
sex, as possessing a nature created in the 
image of God, and allied to the Divine, no 
less than the male, was brought before the 
consciousness, and the sex invested with the 
rights belonging to it ; in opposition to ancient 
Eastern custom, where the woman was placed 
in altogether subordinate relation to man." 
He quotes a passage from Tertullian, on the 
marriage of believers : — 

" What a union is that between two believ- 
ers, having in common one hope, one desire, 
one order of life, one service of the Lord ! 
Both, like brother and sister, undivided in 
spirit or body, may, in the true sense twain 
tn one flesh, kneel, pray, and fast together, 
mutually teach, exhort, and bear with each 
16 



242 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

other ; they are not separated in the Church 
of God and at the Lord's Supper ; they share 
each other's troubles, persecutions, joys ; 
neither has any thing to hide from the other; 
neither avoids the other ; there is free liberty 
to visit the sick, to sustain the needy ; the 
harmony of psalms and hymns goes up between 
them, and each vies with the other in singing 
the praises of their God." 

This description, of which we quote but a 
portion, shows that uniting in spiritual songs 
and the reading of Scripture was the daily 
custom in Christian families. Clement rec- 
ommends the same as daily morning employ- 
ment. The Christians, in general, fell in with 
the Jewish seasons of prayer, — the third, 
sixth, and ninth hours of the day (at 9 a.m., 
12 m., and 3 p.m.). 1 

1 "Evening, and morning, and at noon, will I pray, and 
cry aloud ; and He shall hear my voice," 2 says the Psalmist. 
Daniel prayed three times a day, with his windows open 
toward Jerusalem. 3 The disciples were gathered, on the 
day of Pentecost, "with one accord in one place," at the 

2 Psalm lv. 17. 3 Daniel vi. 10. 



WIDOWS INDEED. 243 

Anna, abiding in the temple, " served " or 
worshipped God withfasttng as well as prayer. 
Jewish observances were more rigorous than 
those of the early Christians, who enjoyed the 
liberty which Christ gave His disciples, and 
believed, with Saint Paul, that the kingdom 
of God consisted " not in meat and drink, 
but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the 
Holy Ghost." 

Hernias (a writer much esteemed in the 
first centuries), in his " Shepherd," a pas- 
toral epistle, gives advice with reference to 
fasting which recalls the passage in Isaiah 
Iviii. 6, 7. 

''Above all, exercise thy abstinence in this, 
to refrain both from speaking and hearing 
what is wrong ; and cleanse thy heart from 
all pollution, from all revengeful feelings, 

third hour ; Peter and John went into the temple " at the 
hour of prayer, being the ninth hour ; " and Peter, at Joppa, 
" went up upon the house-top to pray, about the sixth 
hour ; " while the vis-ion of Cornelius was " about the ninth 
hour of the day." 1 

1 Acts ii. 1, 2, 15, and iii. i, and x. 3, 9. 



244 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

from all covetousness ; and, on the day thou 
fastest, content thyself with bread, vegetables, 
and water, and thank God for these. But 
reckon up what thy meal on this day would 
have cost thee, and give the amount to some 
widow or orphan, or to the poor. ' Cement of 
Alexandria notices the fact that many kinds 
of pagan worship required celibacy and absti- 
nence from meat and wine in their priests ; 
that there were rigid ascetics among the 
Indians ; and hence argued that usages which 
existed in other religions and combined with 
degrading superstitions could not, in them- 
selves, be peculiarly Christian. " As humility 
is shown not by castigation of the body, but 
by gentleness of disposition, so also abstinence 
is a virtue of the soul, consisting not in that 
which is without, but in that which is within 
the man." 

" When the Montanists would have imposed 
new fasts and laws of abstinence on the Church, 
the spirit of evangelical freedom among the 
Christians took strong ground against them. 



WIDOWS INDEED. 245 

All should be free, — act without restraint, — 
according to their peculiar temperament and 
individual necessities." l 

" She that is a widow indeed, and desolate, 
trusteth in God, and continueth in supplica- 
tions and prayers night and day ; " but nothing 
is said of her fasting. 

The expression " night and day," used here 
and elsewhere, 2 denotes constant and habit- 
ual prayer. 

" Men ought always to pray, and not to 
faint." " Watch unto prayer." " Pray with- 
out ceasing." " Continuing instant [or per- 
severing] in prayer." 

" Praying always with all prayer and sup- 
plication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto 
with all perseverance and supplication for 
all saints." 

Must one's whole time be spent, then, in 
the offering of prayer to God ? and can only 
those, who, like Anna and the aged widows, 

1 Neander. 

2 Acts xxvi. 7 and 1 Thcssalonians iii. 10. 



246 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

are laid aside from the active employments 
of life, fully obey these precepts ? Let the 
Fathers speak to us again. 

" He prays without ceasing," says Origen, 
" who suitably unites prayer with action ; for 
active duty is an integrant part of prayer, 
since it would be impossible to understand 
the words of the apostle in any practicable 
sense, unless we represented to ourselves the 
whole life of the believer as one entire and 
connected prayer, of which prayer commonly 
so called forms but a part." In his exposition 
of the Lord's Prayer, he says also, " If we 
duly understand what is meant by praying 
without ceasing, our whole life must express, 
Our Father who art in Heaven." 

Clement says : " Prayer, if I may speak so 
boldly, is intercourse with God. Although 
we do but lisp, although we address God 
without opening the lips, in silence we cry 
to Him in the inward recesses of the heart ; 
for, when the whole direction of the inmost 
soul is to Him, God always hears." 



WIDOWS INDEED. 247 

The words translated " prayer " and " sup- 
plication " mean, respectively, " worship" and 
" entreaty." Both are enjoined, and " trusting 
in God" does not prevent either. " Be careful 
for nothing," says Saint Paul to the Philippians, 
— that is, Be not faint-hearted nor anxious : 
trust; "but in every thing by prayer and 
supplication with thanksgiving let your re- 
quests be made known unto God." l 

" Always," and " in every thing," — not only 
in the season of difficulty, — the true Christian 
knows his need of help in every thing, and 
seeks it. Our desires are to be " made known 
unto God," though He knows them already. 
" The expression of our desires has a purifying 
effect : it strips them of what is selfish." Not 
only " by prayer and supplication," but " with 
thanksgiving," are our requests to be offered. 
The very act of thanksgiving often raises us 
from despondency, and renews our confidence 
in God. " This is my infirmity," said the 
Psalmist, in a season of depression ; " but I 

1 Philippians iv. 6. 



248 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

will remember the years of the right hand of 
the Most High. I will remember the works 
of the Lord : surely I will remember thy won- 
ders of old." 1 " Thou which hast shewed me 
great and sore troubles shalt quicken me again, 
and shalt bring me up again from the depths 
of the earth." " I will sing of the mercies of 
the Lord for ever : with my mouth will I make 
known thy faithfulness to all generations." 

And the very words of his thanksgiving 
have been uttered by generations of rejoicing 
believers ever since. 

Thus, trusting and worshipping, with sup- 
plication and thankfulness, the " peace of God " 
— the rest and repose which come from faith, 
and the blessing which fills the soul — "shall 
keep our hearts and minds through Christ 
Jesus." 

We should rejoice in the privilege of serving 
God by prayer, because " the effectual, fervent 
prayer of a righteous man availctJi much!' We 
remember the prayers of Abraham and Jacob 

1 Psalm lxxvii. 10, II. 



WIDOWS INDEED. 249 

and Moses ; of Hannah, — " For this child I 
prayed, and the Lord has given me my peti- 
tion ; " of Elijah and Elisha, and David and 
Hezekiah, and the prophets, — the earnestness 
and persistence which seemed to compel bless- 
ings from on high. 

How may we offer such persevering and 
effectual prayer ? We are told, sometimes, we 
may be sure our prayers will be answered, if 
they are offered in accordance with the will 
of God ; and we think that means that we 
must have a spirit of submission, since we 
cannot know what is His will for us, or 
whether what we ask would be best. This is 
true ; but there is such a thing as earnestly 
working with God's will, as well as patiently 
submitting to it. 

Do you remember how Luther prayed 
Melanchthon back to life, when he was " already 
speechless and insensible, with his counte- 
nance apparently fixed in death." Turning 
to the window, he poured out fervent prayers. 
" Our Lord God," said Luther, afterwards, 



250 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

" must needs have heard me ; for I brought 
to His remembrance all the promises about 
hearing prayer that I could repeat from the 
Scriptures : so that He must needs hear me, 
if I were to trust His promises." Thereupon, 
he took Melanchthon by the hand, and said : 
" Be of good courage, Philip, thou shalt not 
die." 

Melanchthon having revived enough to 
express his wish not to be called back to 
earth, Luther replied, " Ah, my Philip, thou 
must serve our Lord yet longer here ; " and, 
fetching some food, he forced the unwilling 
Melanchthon to take it, with the threat, " Thou 
must swallow it, or I will speak the ban over 
thee." ' Melanchthon, after his recovery, 
declared that he could truly say that he had 
been called back from death to life, and, if 
Luther had not come, he must have died. 

This is one instance out of many of Luther's 
strong faith in the power of prayer. He said 
once, as Mathesuis tells us, "I have prayed 
our Philip and my Kate and Master Myconius 
out of the jaws of death." 



WIDOWS INDEED. 25 I 

In the Table Talk, he says : "No one be- 
lieves how effectual and mighty is prayer, and 
how much it can bring to pass, but he who has 
learned by experience, and proved it himself. 
This I know, that so often as I have prayed 
fervently, with utter earnestness, I have been 
richly heard, and have received more than I 
asked. God has indeed sometimes tarried ; 
but He has come, notwithstanding." 

Remember those who were healed by Christ 
berates e of tlie faith of friends. Jesus, seeing 
their faith who brought him, said to the sick 
of the palsy, " Thy sins be forgiven thee," and 
afterwards, " Rise up and walk." 1 So the 
centurion's servant was healed, and the Syro- 
phcenician woman obtained the restoration of 
her daughter from the power of evil spirits. 
In both cases, Christ commends their faith, 
which led to their earnest prayers. It does not 
appear that any demoniac applied personally 
for healing, or that he could have been in a 
condition to exercise faith for himself. But 

1 Luke v. 23. 



252 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

wherever Jesus went, "they brought unto 
Him all sick people that were taken with 
divers diseases and torments, and those which 
were possessed with devils, and those which 
were lunatic, and those that had the palsy ; and 
He healed them." He gave this power to His 
disciples : " Heal the sick, . . . cast out devils : 
freely ye have received, freely give ; " i and 
they returned with joy, saying, " Even the 
devils are subject unto us through Thy name." 
In Jerusalem, after the feast of Pentecost, 
" they brought forth the sick into the streets, 
and laid them on beds and couches, that at the 
least the shadow of Peter passing by might 
overshadow some of them ; " and " there came 
also a multitude out of the cities round about 
unto Jerusalem, bringing sick folks, and them 
which were vexed with unclean spirits ; and 
they were healed every o/ie" 2 So when Philip 
went to Samaria, and preached Christ unto the 
people, " unclean spirits, crying with loud voice, 
came out of many that were possessed with 

1 Matthew x. 8. '* Acts v. 15, 16, and viii. 7 






WIDOWS INDEED. 253 

them ; and many taken with palsies, and that 
were lame, were healed. And there was great 
joy in that city." 

" The prayer of faith shall save the sick," 
says Saint James, "and the Lord shall raise 
him up ; and if he have committed sins, they 
shall be forgiven him. Confess your faults one 
to another, and pray one for another, that ye 
may be healed." 

The age of miracles is past, we say ; and 
we look not without suspicion even at well- 
attested caBes of healing, in answer to prayer. 
But, perhaps, if all who have proved the Lord's 
faithfulness to His promise could speak, we 
should be astonished to know how many lives 
have been saved through the strong, persistent 
prayer and effort of their best-beloved friends. 

If we were to suggest a physical theory of 
the power of prayer in restoring the sick, it 
would be the magnetic influence of a strong 
will, especially when its power was upheld by 
a mighty faith. Luther felt that his will was 
one with God's, or he would not have dared 



254 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

to pray as he did. He put God's promises to 
the test, and his holy boldness seems justified 
by the result. " Nothing is impossible to him 
who wills," says Carlyle. " We do not yield 
us to the evil angels, nor to death utterly, but 
only through the weakness of our feeble 
wills." 

But if we deem it inconsistent with a spirit 
of submission to exercise such will-power, 
such fervency of entreaty, for temporal bless- 
ings or the recovery of the sick, there can 
be no doubt of its rightness with regard to 
spiritual blessings. It must be in accordance 
with the will of God that those who are led 
captive by Satan should be released from 
bondage, that dead souls should live again, 
that sick and crippled, maimed and paralyzed 
souls should be restored to health and sound- 
ness. Let us have strong, overcoming faith 
to offer importunate, prevailing prayer ! 
" That it may please Thee to strengthen such 
as do stand, and to comfort and help the weak- 
hearted, and to raise up those that fall, and 



WIDOWS INDEED. 255 

finally to beat down Satan under our feet ; 
we beseech Thee to hear us, Good Lord ! " 

" The prayer of the Christian," says Tertul- 
lian, " draws down no retribution from heaven ; 
but it averts God's anger ; it watches for its 
enemies ; it intercedes for the persecutors ; 
it obtains the forgiveness of sins ; it dispels 
temptations ; it comforts the feeble-minded ; 
it refreshes the strong. Prayer is the bulwark 
of faith." 

" Women received their dead raised to life 
again." Oh, widowed mothers ! have you 
sons spiritually dead, insensible to the voice 
of Christ ? Pray, and faint not. It may be 
that, through your faith, they shall be given 
you, raised to life. How knowest thou, O 
mother, whether thou shalt save thy son ? 

It was recently my privilege to enjoy the 
society of a widow, whose long life of piety 
had culminated in a most desirable state of 
mind. She was an example how " tribulation 
worketh patience ; and patience, experience ; 
and experience, hope." 



256 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

We had been speaking of a mutual friend, 
who was unreconciled to the death of her 
husband. The pain of bereavement was not 
aggravated by other troubles, for her outward 
circumstances were unchanged. She lived on, 
in the same house as before his death, with 
her affectionate children still around her. She 
had property, and was self-reliant, and fully 
competent to manage her own affairs ; yet 
she constantly pined for her husband, was 
inconsolable, and thought God almost cruel to 
take him from her. We spoke to her of his 
great gain, and asked, " Does not the thought 
of his happiness, as a glorified spirit, comfort 
you? " 

" Oh," said she, " that only reminds me how 
completely we are separated. He used to 
depend so much upon me for his happiness. 
He was never contented without me ; and to 
think that I can never, never, be the same to 
him again ! " 

We were shocked at the selfishness of this 
view, and feared her chastening had not 



WIDOWS INDEED. 257 

wrought the peaceable fruits of righteousness, 
and that she would receive still further cor- 
rection : and so it proved ; for she soon after 
lost her son. At his death, she said, " I must 
confess, I have been more anxious that he 
should be honorable among men than that 
he should serve God faithfully." 

What a confession for a Christian woman 
to make over the grave of her son ! 

" But," said Mrs. B., as we recalled this, " I 
do not think it was all selfishness in her case. 
She would have been willing that her husband 
should go to Europe, and be happy without 
her, had it seemed best for him. The trouble 
with her is that she does not appreciate the 
bliss of heaven, and understand that it is but 
a little time and we shall be reunited, or she 
would rejoice in his joy. Now heaven seems 
so transcendently blessed to me, I could not 
wish my loved ones back to this imperfect 
life. My husband suffered much from weari- 
ness and pain. His was a most laborious 
ministry, in an uncongenial clime : the very 
17 



258 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

atmosphere was disheartening, loaded with 
malaria, and filling one with depression. The 
mortality in the region was sometimes fearful, 
and he was in such close sympathy with his 
people as to make all their griefs his own. A 
great part of our work was to visit the sick 
and dying, to comfort mourners, and cheer 
the despondent and faint-hearted. However 
deep the snow or keen the wind, they thought 
no one could be buried without his services, 
nor married by any other clergyman, let the 
night be never so dark and stormy. Last 
winter was very severe, and I often thanked 
God that my husband was safely sheltered in 
the heavenly mansions, where there is no 
more death, nor any more pain, and where all 
tears are wiped away. I was truly grateful 
that, after all his self-denying toil, he had been 
called to enter into his Master's joy. Not 
that I think of him as idle. You know 'tis 
said, ' His servants shall serve Him.' That 
was my husband's delight here : how much 
more now, where ' the inhabitant shall not 



WIDOWS IXDEED. 259 

say, I am sick.' He was faithful over a few 
things, now he is ruler over many things : his 
service as much greater and more efficient, as 
the new development and perfection of his 
powers." 

" You had seen him suffer, year after year," 
I remarked ; " and this helped you to acqui- 
escence in his death." 

" No, that was not all which reconciled me. 
My son was taken suddenly, immediately after 
commencing his ministry, and my feelings 
were the same. I always think of them as 
among the glorified, the cloud of witnesses 
who beckon us on, and urge us to be true to 
our high calling. How can I wish them back 
from their great reward ! " 

" But for yourself ! Do you not pity your- 
self, and mourn over your loneliness, — your 
home in the old parsonage broken up, and you 
so far from the people of your love ? " 

" Do I not hear Christ saying, ' The time 
is shont ; Let those that weep be as though 
they wept not ? ' He helps me to forget 
myself in my interest for others." 



260 THE WIDOW'S TRL'ST. 

" Have you no anxiety, no fear for the 
future ? " 

" Not the slightest. Why should I distrust 
my Shepherd, my loving Friend, my Father ? 
Would you have the child, for whom you have 
done the most, lose confidence in your loving 
care and in your expressed promises ? Nothing 
that my Father in heaven appoints can harm 
me. Outward circumstances matter little. 
Life consists not in the abundance of things 
possessed. Worldly good is worthless, com- 
pared with the peace Christ gives, and the 
joy which those possess who abide in Him. 
I can sometimes fully respond to the quotation 
you read me from Mrs. P.'s poems. 

'But Thou, who, taking much, so much hast given, 
Hast granted me the very peace of Heaven. 
My God ! Thine eye, omniscient and divine, 
Rests on no calmer, happier heart than mine : 
Empty of all things else, what room for Thee, 
Who hast been, art, and wilt be All to me ! ' 

" My four sons are all young ministers," 
she continued. " They are poor ; and I am 



WIDOWS INDEED. 26 1 

entirely satisfied that it should be so. The 
youngest of them preached his first sermon 
last Sabbath ; when I told him I would rather 
hear such words from him, and know that he 
was helping others toward heaven, than to 
see him a millionnaire. 

" My prayer, from their birth, has always 
been, that they might labor for Christ, even 
if but in some dark corner of the earth." 
Then she added, " My most ardent desire now 
is to help some one, no matter how humble, in 
the Divine life. 

" I do not expect to do more than a few little 

things ; but I am daily and hourly watching 

for that small and obscure work, for which 

alone I feel fitted." 

" Thy lodging is in childlike hearts, 
Thou makest there Thy nest." 

If all widows could gain this state of mind, 
what an army of true workers would there be 
for the Church ! Doubtless, all might thus 
come up from the wilderness, " leaning on the 
Beloved." 



262 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

Do we not hear our Lord saying, "Thou 
shalt not remember the reproach of thy widow- 
hood any more, for thy Maker is thine hus- 
band : the Lord of Hosts is His name ? " 

" Turn, O backsliding children, saith the 
Lord ; for I am married unto you." 

" That ye should be married to another, 
even to Him who is raised from the dead, 
that we should bring forth fruit unto God!' 




WIDOWS INDEED. 263 

" In the night, Thy song shall be with me." 

' C^S C0MF0RTER of God ' s redeemed, 
^-^ Whom the world does not see, 
What hand should pluck me from the flood 

That casts my soul on Thee ? 
Who would not suffer pain like mine 

To be consoled like me ? 

When I am feeble as a child, 

And flesh and heart give way, 
Then on Thy everlasting strength 

With passive trust I stay, 
And the rough wind becomes a song, 

The darkness shines like day. 

Oh, blessed are the eyes that see, 

Though silent anguish show 
The love that in their hours of sleep 

Unthanked may come and go ; 
And blessed are the ears that hear, 

Though kept awake by woe. 

Happy are they that learn, in Thee, 
Though patient suffering teach, 

The secret of enduring strength, 

And praise too deep for speech, — 

Peace that no pressure from without, 
No strife within, can reach. 



264 THE WIDOW'S TRUST. 

My heart is fixed, O God my strength, 

My heart is strong to bear j 
I will be joyful in Thy love, 

And peaceful in Thy care. 
Deal with me, for the Saviour's sake, 

According to His prayer ! 

Deep unto deep may call, but I 

With peaceful heart will say, — 
Thy loving kindness hath a charge 

' No waves can take away ; 
And let the storm that speeds me home 
Deal with me as it may." 

Miss A. L. Waring. 



" We which have believed do enter into rest." 

" For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased 
from his own works. 

" Let us labor therefore to enter into that rest." — He- 
brews iv. 3, 10, ii. 

" O rest in the Lord, wait patiently for Him." — Psalm 
xxxvii. 7. 

" And therefore will the Lord wait, that He may be 
gracious unto you, and therefore will He be exalted, that 
He may have mercy upon you : for the Lord is a God of ' 
judgment : blessed are all they that wait for Him. 

u Thou shalt weep no more : He will be very gracious 
unto thee at the voice of thy cry ; when He shall hear it, 
He will answer thee." — Isaiah xxx. 18, 19. 

"And the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all 
faces." — Isaiah xxv. 8. 

" Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is 
stayed on Thee : because he trusteth in Thee." — Isaiah 
xxvi. 3. 



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